About the Artist
Dwight Ritscher and Nicole Nelson are a married duo from Burlington, Vermont, who came up in the blues and roots clubs of New York and New England. Across more than twenty years as independent artists, they have moved through blues, jazz, country, punk, and roots, and turned down record deals their families thought were crazy to pass up. Nicole once competed on The Voice. Their new album, Day or Night, was produced by Joel Hamilton and cut down from roughly 163 songs to 12.
Dwight + Nicole
About the Episode (Episode 139)
Dwight + Nicole: Twenty Years of Protecting the Spark
Most independent artists Jason English talks to are figuring it out one month at a time. Dwight and Nicole have been figuring it out for more than twenty years, married the whole way, running the band like a small business while protecting the thing that made them want to do it at all. In this conversation they get into how a duo keeps its fights off the stage, why they kept passing on deals, and how you steer a small boat through a music industry that keeps changing under you.
Key Conversation Points
A marriage and a band, in that order: They fought badly when they first got together. Sharing a stage taught them to drop it. As Nicole puts it, "it kind of trains you to let things go."
The small-boat math of an indie career: They turned down contracts their families called a mistake to keep the freedom to write whatever came out. "This little boat is carrying a lot of energy," Nicole says, "and we're supposed to take care of that."
Still a beginner after two decades: Nicole taught herself bass by booking the gig first. "I'm a happy beginner at the beginning of my creative journey all the time."
Their new record, Day or Night, started as roughly 163 songs and ended as 12. One of them, "Beautiful," grew out of a dream Nicole had the night her grandmother died. The way she tells that dream is worth the whole episode.