It’s In Their DNA

WAITSBURG -- To bud as a musician, it helps to have good mentors.

Ann Lehman and Daniel FitzSimmons had them.

For Lehman, it was Rye Grass String Band guitarist Jon St. Hilaire. For FitzSimmons, it was Nashville musician Skylar Wilson and Old Crow Medicine Show member Cory Younts.

But mentors merely plant the seed. The rest comes from within, fed by life stories and audiences that appreciate what they hear, as they do when Lehman and FitzSimmons take the stage as the duo DNA (short for Daniel & Ann).

After years of wandering different musical paths from folk and country rock to funk and jazz, Walla Walla-based Lehman and FitzSimmons have found each other as musical partners and settled on what they call "alternative Americana," an umbrella term that covers and marries genres native to America, including folk, rock, blues and jazz.

To that they add their own musical dimension and end up with something FitzSimmons jokingly calls "folkarockadelica." In other words, a unique blend that defies any attempt to label it.

"We're lovers of music," FitzSimmons said. "We appreciate various eclectic sounds."

About his own contribution to the duo, the 38-year-old former Army broadcast journalist said "Sometimes it's sweet and gentle like James Taylor. Sometimes it has the acerbic wit of Tom Waits."

Lehman said she was strongly influenced by Shawn Colvin, but always stays current and is now drawn to the likes of Bon Iver and Iron & Wine.

Waitsburg music lovers had a chance to get a taste of DNA's gift as singer/song writers when the duo performed several of their pieces during Coppei Cafe's first Open Mic event last Saturday night.

They're back at Coppei at 7 p.m. this Saturday, March 10, for a full two-hour concert with a surprise opening act. Listeners can expect the strength of Lehman's voice and rhythm guitar stitched to the fabric of FitzSimmons' vocals and lead guitar.

If the couple's name sounds unfamiliar, it's because their career as stage performers together is just about to take off, based on a long-term goal to record new work, organize and polish existing work, and do regular shows in the Walla Walla area.

But neither musician is a stranger to their trade.

Though music was never promoted as a career during the artists' younger years, it was encouraged as a hobby.

Lehman, 51, grew up in a family of medical professionals and ultimately became a nurse herself. She now serves as a social worker for the chemical dependency unit at Walla Walla's Veterans Administration hospital.

She was born in Walla Walla, but moved to Guadalajara at age 5 when her dad decided to pursue a medical degree in Mexico. She didn't move back to the states until she was 13, having experienced an entirely different musical culture but also having had her mother's church- oriented organ and piano music.

At age 12, her dad bought her a guitar and someone got her a book of folk songs. She didn't get a formal musical education, but never felt she needed one.

"I play by ear," she said about a musical talent FitzSimmons describes as "intuitive."

Music took a back seat to marriage and raising three children at a young age, but returned to Lehman's life in the mid '90s when she had bands that performed at the Walla Walla Farmers Market, including Left of Cool with Walla Walla Community College guitar instructor Kevin Stauffer.

More recently, she finished her nursing degree and decided it was time to nurture her musical interests.

"I've been hungry for it," she said, pointing out she took a "bucket list" approach to pursuing a passion she'd put on hold. "I recently turned the corner and asked myself 'what have you always wanted to do and why aren't you doing it?'"

She met Lehman during a veterans get together where they both performed.

FitzSimmons, 38, was born in Crested Butte, Colo., and grew up on Oahu and in Sonora just outside Yosemite National Park. His first musical expression came when he was three and sang a Beach Boys song at a talent show.

His mother was a theater director and he got involved in music through the performing arts such as theater and dance. At age 17, he began playing the bass, harmonica and flute.

He had two folk rock bands while in Sonora and then moved to Nashville to study audio engineering at Middle Tennessee State University. That gave him the connections with the music industry through which he met and played studio session for Wilson and Younts.

Before long, he also produced a live music show and managed a live music venue in Nashville, but he was turned off by the business side of the music industry. He enlisted in the Army as a broadcast journalist before getting a film degree from Brooklyn College and working as a location manager on feature films.

The Army recalled him for a one-year tour of Baghdad, Iraq, where he worked for the State Department. After his tour, he wandered over to Walla Walla via Port Townsend and got involved in doing some local film and audio work.

FitzSimmons said he inspired early on by Bob Dylan, Steve Earl and Stephen Stills, and later by Paul Simon, Prince and Ryan Adams. Now he is a big fan of My Morning Jacket and George Clinton.

He still plays all the instruments he picked up as a teenager and practices the fiddle "when no one's listening."

FitzSimmons likes to describe himself as a "troubadour," saying he "likes to tell a story with a good back beat and so does Ann."

Meeting Lehman, who introduced him to her current favorite bands and her own original music, "was an inspiration," FitzSimmons said.

"Her voice is such a gift," he said. "We feel blessed to be able to do what we do. The opportunity to do what we've always wanted to do (write, perform and record music) is becoming more and more a reality."

Musical Duo DNA In Concert Saturday, March 10 Coppei Coffee Co. 7 to 10 p.m. 137 Main St. Waitsburg