Student Activities Office - Madison Cunningham

Madison Cunningham is a 26-year-old GRAMMY award-winning artist and songwriter known for her “wonderfully tangled imagery and cutting self-awareness” (NPR). As a guitarist, Madison has pushed the boundaries of a conventional singer-songwriter as her “guitar work is both classic and wildly emotive, and her soaring vocals are pristine and inspired” (Consequence). Madison first picked up a guitar at age seven, and by age twelve was singing and performing alongside her five siblings in church. In her teenage years, she met Tyler Chester who would later go on to be a close collaborator and producer of several of Madison’s projects including Who Are You Now (2019) which Atwood Magazine described as “a guitar-driven record, full of twisting, meticulously arranged parts and interlocking melodies. It’s almost labyrinthine; you could get lost in her swirling words.”

Cunningham’s latest effort, Revealer, won the GRAMMY for ‘Best Folk Album.’ Revealer finds her working once again with producer Tyler Chester along with Mike Elizondo and Tucker Martine. Written and recorded over all states of the pandemic, Madison says, “To me, ‘revealer’ is the binding theme of the album. The hand that slowly chips away at the mirror in which you see yourself and the world and replaces it with the reflection that is most true.” The album is “full of intricate musicianship, alongside forthright observations” (All Music), intimations and hard truths—a self-portrait of a young artist who is full of doubt and uncertainty yet bursting with exciting ideas about music and life.