This article appears in the January 2012 issue of Louisville Magazine. To subscribe, please visit Loumag.com .
“I can at least pick most things with strings,” Mize says. “I don’t do any wind instruments so that’s the next thing; I’d love to play the clarinet.” Originally from Cadiz, Ky., Mize moved to Louisville as a kid and, following Youth Performing Arts School, scored a scholarship to play violin at the University of Louisville. “I liked the group experience of being in an orchestra, the power of 60 people working toward the same goal,” Mize says. “I never wanted to stand onstage and play by myself. When I’m up there, sometimes I really do get lost in what I’m doing, which is the best place I’ve found to be.” She became a musical therapist after college but also started playing with local musicians for fun; she toured as a violinist in Bonnie Prince Billy’s band. “That was the impetus to go more toward performing,” Mize says. (Her new album, We Don’t Need, is out this month.) On her Halloween show, performing as PJ Harvey: “It was certainly outside of my comfort zone, just in the guitar playing and the singing style that she uses, which is much more guttural and less about making a pretty voice. Just trying to channel that was incredibly fun to do.”
Photo: courtesy Mickie Winters
