Michael J. Miles
“Why do I approach music the way I do? There is no end—every day the world walks by with stories, and birds fly by with songs. I try to pay attention and find inspiration. I taught myself to play and have found my soul inside the banjo, inside the guitar. My voice comes through, along with the voices of different eras, places, and people.”
Photo by Gregory Heisler
“It just fit my inner jukebox”
There are those who represent the American Songbook or one particular style of music. Michael J. Miles, and his insatiable banjo covers the world songbook, and with the Great American Jukebox, he leans deeply into his own inner jukebox—20th century songs from AM radio and his father’s player piano.
Photo by Gregory Heisler
100 Years of Protest
Photo by Charles Osgood
With Pete Seeger. Photo by Ken Vydra.
Educator-student
As a student of the music, Miles is the consummate teacher. The renowned Old Town School of Folk Music named him the 2018 Musician and Educator of the Year. In 2024 he was honored by Illinois Arts Council with an Artist Fellowship Award. He has taught at universities, camps, festivals, schools and woven musical collaborations around the world. He’s also learned from and worked with many musical masters Pete Seeger, Bela Fleck & Janos Starker.
Concert in Beirut, Lebanon
With Glenbard East HS, Photo by Chris Walker
Urban heart-ageless soul
Clawhammer banjo and roots guitar aren’t necessarily the tools of expression in the urban vortex of Chicago, Miles’ lifelong home. But he brings the city’s NOW to the timeless melodies of world’s greatest music. J.S. Bach, Stevie Wonder. His musical roots and approach are part sophistication, part grit. All heart.
Photo by Bruce Vogele
Photo by Richard Marin
Politics and poetry
“Those are two things I love. On a good day I can mix the two, and that’s when the magic starts to happen, when the ideas are there to share. William Blake said: ‘Mine is to create, not to compare’. Me, I want to create and share. Deeply. That’s what my performances are all about.”