About Jan Erickson
Biography
The Cowboy lifestyle is completely foreign and unknown to most people. Jan not only sings about that lifestyle, but starting as a young boy and up until his mid twenties, he was fortunate enough to have lived it.
As a singer and poet, Jan has been center stage at the “Orrin Porter Rockwell Cowboy Poetry Festival” in Brigham City. He was honored to perform at the “Great Western Foxtrotter Show” in South Jordan, and has entertained audiences at the “Canyon Country Western Arts Festival” in Cedar City, one of his favorite gatherings. While in Cedar City, Jan was featured on 91.1 KSUU Radio during Art Bohman’s “Cowboy Country” show. His version of “The Colorado Trail” has received air play on “Classic Heartland”, a streaming web station.
“The Red Rock Ranch Cafe” in South Fork Canyon and the “Fielding Garr Historical Ranch” on Antelope Island, are a couple of the more interesting and authentic cowboy venues where he’s performed.
In previous years Jan has also been invited to “The Festival of the American West” in Wellsville, the “Utah Western Heritage Festival” in Spanish Fork, “The Spring Roundup” in Smithfield and the “Cowboy Poetry Gathering and Buckaroo Fair” in Heber City.
Jan tells a bit about his years past:
“I was born in Cache Valley then raised in Clinton, Utah, the northern most city of Davis County. At that time Clinton was an unincorporated rural farming and ranching community with a population of around 700.
Life was simple and predictable. I attended school with wonderful friends and worked for the ranchers and farmers in the area. My Uncle Melvin Erickson lived in Logan, Utah, and was the first Cowboy I ever knew. In the 1920s while riding in a Wyoming rodeo, Melvin had been permanently disabled after getting bucked and thrown against a good sturdy fence. But it didn’t change his respect and love for horses. He taught me my first lessons about their behavior and how to care for them.
Willie Frogget, my grandfather, tended flocks of sheep on the summer mountain ranges of northern Utah and southern Idaho. On occasion, I would stay with him at the sheep camp for a week or more. I would take his horse to round up the sheep, while with whistle commands he would direct the dogs (Border Collies). I remember visiting him and not seeing another person until my folks came to take me home. Those times taught me about the isolation and lonliness which the 19th century line riders and prospectors must have experienced.
At home, my musically talented mother would play popular and classical piano pieces while I would listen and watch her fingers dance across the keyboard. I believe that is how I received my basic musical skills. At age 8, I was given a Ukulele for my birthday and with encouragement from Uncle Melvin, started singing cowboy songs. The first songs I remember doing were “Clementine”, “Ol’ Paint” and “The Strawberry Roan”. My folks also encouraged me to enroll in school band and choir classes.
During my junior high school years, the folk music era began. Two of my good friends and I formed a folk singing trio. At that time my parents were nice enough to buy me a five string banjo and a guitar. That trio was my first of many groups, and it lasted until we went our separate ways following high school graduation.
After high school, I spent a couple of years in Texas, then returned to Utah to attend school at Brigham Young University. During my sophomore year, I lived on the Hamilton Teichert cattle ranch in Benjamin, Utah. The rent was partially paid by doing chores and tending to the cattle whenever I wasn’t in school. The Teicherts also had some great cutting horses for working the herd. Later on, buckaroo jobs were offered around the Bear River area of Wyoming. During that summer, it was discovered that my long time allergies included horses. So horses have been off limits ever since.
My musical life continued as I took up playing acoustic upright and electric bass, (that’s pronounced base for you fishermen). At BYU, I listened to the popular rock stations of the time, but a local bluegrass band and their music are what caught my attention. For a couple of decades as a bluegrass nut, I was fortunate enough to sing and play bass with some very good bluegrass bands. Then in the late 1980s, I joined a band that was playing mainstream country music. That happened only because of the bluegrass influence by such artists as Ricky Skaggs, Vince Gill and so on. Following my country phase, I made a sudden twist, falling headlong into Chicago style Blues. The driving rhythms and simple chord patterns are hypnotic, loud and great for getting people into the music. There is one problem with playing amplified instruments, it’s hard on a man’s hearing. So bye, bye blues.
In late 1998, I met singer/songwriter Brenn Hill and began working with him as a bassist/vocalist. During the five years with Brenn, I saw how the modern Cowboy music movement was gaining ground. It was only natural to become a serious participant and solo artist. The songs are positive, uplifting and understandable. They tell real life stories of things I have lived. I was finally coming home to my music after being gone for many years.
Writing songs and poetry about Cowboys and the West is a logical path to follow. I am able to tell of family tales, and times spent buckarooin’. Also, I married one of the daughters of a Star Valley, Wyoming cattle man. Judy, my life and duet partner, is also an excellent singer and does her own songs during our shows.
Although being around the ranch is no longer practical, I can still cowboy up when singing for others. Visiting Judy’s brothers and sisters can also offer a dose of the cowboy life. Most of them are ranchers and horse lovers living in western Wyoming and southern Idaho.”
For more info Contact: jrickson09@gmail.com
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