It chose me.

All I do is play live. Moslty at cowboy gatherings, parties, and just about anywhere they will let me. Once in a while I even get paid.

I think the internet has given the music buying public something that the major players in the music industry have never allowed them: choices. And it has given artists who don't fit the the current major label mold (take that any way you like) a fantastic marketing tool and a much wider audience.

Probably not. Of course it would be a cold day you know where if I was even offered a contract with a major label. But I think I would rather just do it my way.

Born and raised in Southern New Mexico, Laurie Wood started playing guitar when she was sixteen. After playing in “at least a dozen” different country bands over as many years she grew disillusioned with the music and the lifestyle, finally quitting music altogether. Now, more than 15 years later, Laurie has felt the call to dust off her guitar, and is playing the music that speaks to her rural agricultural roots. She says she played “Top Forty” Country for money, but it was always Western music and Cowboy songs that she played for friends, family, and herself. She calls Wyoming home these days, along with husband Duane, who is the cow/calf manager on CSU’s One Bar Eleven ranch near Encampment. They have two children, Cora Rose, 5 (who you will often see on stage with Laurie), and Bonner, 3.

Laurie has performed at the Sagebrush Cowboyography Poetry and Music Gathering in Sheridan, WY; the Grand Encampment Cowboy Gathering in Encampment, WY; the Riverton, WY Cowboy Roundup; and the Durango Cowboy Gathering in Durango, CO. She is a member of the Cowboy Poets of the Wind River and the Western Music Association, and serves as Treasurer for the Grand Encampment Cowboy Gathering Outfit as well as President of the Snowy Range Cattle Women.

Ian Tyson, Red Steagall, The Amazing Rythm Aces, early EmmyLou Harris and Linda Ronstadt, Don Edwards, Gary Stewart, Bob Wills, The Allman Brothers, Patsy Cline, Chris Ledoux, The Marshall Tucker Band, Dave Stamey, Jerry Jeff Walker. You name it and it if it was music it probably had an influence.

My back porch.

A Guild F-45 CE. I would love to say that I play through a BOSE Personal Amplification System. But I don't.