Background
Cashavelly Morrison was born Melissa Diane Meredith Bickey in the coal mining town of Beckley, West Virginia.
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Cashavelly Morrison
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She began dancing from the age of 3, leaving home when she turned 15 to study ballet at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. She turned dancing into a professional career, which she had to quit after a severe spinal injury at the age of 20. She went on to get her undergraduate and master’s degrees in English and Creative Writing at Salem College and later at Hollins University and turned her creative energy towards writing prose and later her own songs.
They played together guitar and autoharp, perfecting their musical style.
They recorded sparse versions of their songs at Echo Mountain studio in Asheville, North Carolina, moving onto to develop the songs with further instrumentation at the suggestion of their sound engineer Cashavelly Morrison conceived her songs as an exploration of shared grief, to emphasize universal compassion for those who go unheard and unseen.
She quoted Jean Ritchie as her most important influence.Her songs blend together the traditions of American roots, the ballads of Appalachia, and represent a confessional gateway into loss and her deeply held values, notably the racial prejudices in the United States. and the dire need for equal rights and empowerment for women.
