Erica is an award-winning singer-songwriter based in western Massachusetts.
Her most recent CD, Good Summer Rain, was sponsored in part by the Trust for Public Land and won the 2008 National Association for Interpretation Media Award for Best Interpretive Music.
Her first cassette, Strong Heart, was released in 1989, when she was still working as a waitress at a local café. She named her music company Blue Pie in honor of the waitress shorthand for blueberry pie.
Around that time, Erica began opening for national touring acts at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton, Massachusetts, where she quickly became a headliner.
Erica’s 1992 CD From That Far received national critical acclaim, while her 1997 release The Harvest—produced by Grammy Award–winning bluegrass artist Laurie Lewis—was released on Signature Sounds and is widely considered her breakthrough recording. The album garnered reviews from The Washington Post to the San Francisco Bay Guardian, featured an interview on NPR’s All Things Considered, and charted for six months on Billboard’s Gavin Americana Chart, including five weeks in the Top 10.
This was followed by Three Wishes in 1999, the live CD Almost Like Tonight in 2004, and Good Summer Rain in 2008.
Good Summer Rain
2008/Blue Pie Music
“If this CD doesn’t compel you to get outside and enjoy what little green space we have left, put it on for a mental break while you’re stuck in the concrete grid of rush hour.” Performing Songwriter Magazine
“Listening to Good Summer Rain is like flipping through the photo album of an Ansel Adams road trip. Each artfully created song transports the listener to a particular location, like a snapshot in time.”
Planet Jackson Hole News
The Harvest
1996/Signature Sounds
Listen
Learn More
“Wheeler is the perfect Americana fit.”
Gavin's Billboard Americana Chart“The Harvest is a splendid demonstration of Erica Wheeler’s talents as a writer and performer.”
Dirty Linen"Wheeler is adept at melding people, place and events in simple ways that illuminate all three."
The Washington Post
three wishes
1999 Signature Sounds
Listen
Learn More
"(Her) voice and lyrics are beautifully expressive. A major talent"
Boston Herald
"There are many original songs here that seem to capture a moment or a story so well that you can't imagine them being done better... I can't stop listening to it. Three Wishes is one of my picks among the best of this year's independent recordings."
Folk & Acoustic Music Exchange, Roberta B. Schwartz
"...possibly Wheeler's best work to date. Another outstanding release from one of our best new singer-songwriters" Dirty Linen
Almost Like Tonight
2004/Blue Pie Music
"This mostly acoustic album finds Wheeler doing what she does best, which is enchanting crowds with her songs and personality. Most of the songs are from her previous albums with a few covers mixed in. You also get one previously unreleased song to make it even more enticing. She came up on the open mike and coffee house circuit and has never strayed from her roots and vision. This is one of those discs where if you close your eyes you’d swear you were there."
VillageRecords.com