Earle Hitchner

music columnist, Irish Echo

Besides contributing articles and reviews to the *Wall Street Journal*, Earle Hitchner is a weekly music columnist for the *Irish Echo* newspaper. He has also written on music for *Billboard*, MTV's *Sonicnet*, *Details*, *New Choices*, and *The Oxford American*, and been a seven-time nominating judge for annual awards given by the Association for Independent Music (AFIM). Earle has provided liner notes for more than 50 recordings, including the Grammy-nominated *The Celtic Album* by the Boston Pops Orchestra in 1998. In 1999, he wrote 6 essays for the widely praised reference book *The Companion to Irish Traditional Music*, co-published by Cork University Press and New York University Press. He has also consulted on four film documentaries of Irish traditional music broadcast on public television, and lectured on the subject at Boston College, New York University, Milwaukee Irish Fest, and the Bardavon 1869 Opera House in Poughkeepsie, N.Y.