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Laura Cortese/The Dance Cards

Laura Cortese has a vision for her band's sound: bold and elegant, schooled in the lyrical rituals of folk music and backed by grooves that alternately inspire
Cajun two-stepping and rock-n-roll hip swagger. It's appropriate then that the trio, featuring Cortese, call themselves Laura Cortese & the Dance Cards.

Since appearing on Cortese's most recent album, Into the Dark (2013), Valerie Thompson (cello/vox) and Mariel Vandersteel (fiddle/hardingfele/vox)
have paired their sophisticated string arrangements and rich vocal harmonies to Cortese's poignant and powerful singing

.Cortese grew up in San Francisco and moved to Boston to study violin at Berklee College of Music. She has since immersed herself in the city's vibrant
indie music scene and enjoyed a busy sideman career, which has included appearances with Band of Horses at Carnegie Hall, Pete Seeger at Newport Folk Festival,
and Patterson Hood and Michael Franti for Seeger's ninetieth birthday celebration at Madison Square Garden.

Valerie Thompson and Mariel Vandersteel bring their own multi-genered credentials to the mix. Thompson has shared the stage with acclaimed jazz pianist Fred Hersch,
indie-rock icon Amanda Palmer, multimedia artist Christopher Janney, and CMH Records' Vitamin String Quartet (including a guest appearance on Gossip Girl.)
Vandersteel came of age musically nurtured by the Bay Area's rich revivalist traditional music scene. She attended Berklee College of Music and studied hardingfele in Norway,
that country's national instrument. In 2009 she released a solo album, Hickory.

True to their adventurous spirit and wide-ranging influences, the group was recently selected from a pool of 400 bands to tour with the US State Department's
American Music Abroad program. Starting in January 2014, they will set off to an as-yet-undisclosed region of the world to perform and teach as artist ambassadors.
Such a mission is perfect for this trio, whose music communicates the depth and soul of American roots music, using their own uniquely modern voices.