Abbie Gardner is an excellent young singer who, due to her upbringing, sounds very comfortable performing vintage swing standards that were popular decades before her birth. She grew up around jazz since her father, pianist Herb Gardner, had played with Roy Eldridge and Gene Krupa. She played violin for a year, extensively studied classical flute, and today also plays guitar and Dobro. As a singer, she was a member of the Boston University Inner Strength Gospel Choir, worked with a cappella groups, and was the musical director for the Treblemakers. But although she earned a degree in occupational therapy at Boston University, singing jazz was always her true love. In 2000 Gardner started singing with the Galvanized Jazz Band. Since that time she has performed with Stan Rubin's Tigertown Five, Vince Giordano's Nighthawks, the New Deal Orchestra, and Herb Gardner's Groundhog Band. Abbie Gardner made her recording debut on 2004's My Craziest Dream, a set that she shared with her father. In recent times she has also performed Appalachian ballads and contemporary folk and country standards in the female trio Red Molly. ~ Scott Yanow