About

Recipient of the Detroit Music Awards for Outstanding Americana Songwriter, Mary McGuire has a myriad of influences and growing up in Detroit during the 70s and was schooled by the jocks at America’s first underground radio stations. They had a major influence on her early folk, rock, country, and blues music education.

Matt Harmon of the Detroit Metro Times shares “she seemingly shifts genres at will….” chalk that up to being an avid listener, studying music while living, writing, recording and performing across America. Joe Montague of Riveting Riffs Magazine writes, “Michigan singer-songwriter and musician Mary McGuire may be one of the most underappreciated, yet most gifted artists in America today.”

Her evolution as a songwriter comes from the places she’s lived - the rock and blues influences in industrial Detroit, gentler folk rock influences from the shores of Martha’s Vineyard and the country rock rhythms of the horses clipping along on the car-free streets of Mackinac Island. Absorbing all of this is what influences her and defines her characteristic songwriting style. Expect a glimpse of these very influences gleaned from the Upper Midwest to the East Coast and back in her live performances.

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Detroit - She was caller 11 on Detroit's hit radio station WDRQ with legendary disc jockey China Jones. At the station on 8 Mile Road in Detroit, the closet doors opened and her 11 year old arms were loaded up with the entire Beatles discography. Back at home, Mary dropped the needle on side one of Revolver on her blue Panasonic record player and at that the moment she was hooked. Growing up in 70's Detroit and learning from the radio jocks of America's first underground radio stations - WABX, WRIF, W4, etc., was all it took for Mary to pick up the guitar and learn her first Beatles, Neil Young, Eagles, Pink Floyd, and Led Zeppelin tunes. Once she started, her appetite for acoustic rock guitar was fueled.

Loads of guitar lessons, gigging solo, and stints in bands with like minded musicians writing and recording led her to rack up miles on the highways across America. Mary suddenly found her writing songs about where she was, what she saw and what she was doing from her perspective gleaned in the Upper Midwest.