About Sam
Where Tradition Meets Innovation
Sam Pacetti represents a culmination of the best of the American and British traditions.
Growing up in North Florida, he discovered the music of Chet Atkins and Merle Travis at thirteen —
and shortly after found his greatest mentor in Gamble Rogers, the legendary picker and raconteur
from St. Augustine who took the young Pacetti under his wing.
Their weekly sessions lasted a year, until Rogers tragically died saving a drowning tourist at Flagler Beach.
The brief yet profound relationship instilled in Pacetti the importance of the folk process —
the passing of music and oral tradition from teacher to student.
Martin Simpson, Richard Thompson, Joni Mitchell and Merle Travis are touchstones to Pacetti.
While there are strong elements of the American primitive school throughout his work,
a powerful raw emotionality — earthy and sensual, more Greg Brown than musical academician — runs beneath every note.
"Although the woods are full of young guitar virtuosos, few have developed the style, technique and artistic wisdom of Sam Pacetti."
— Dirty Linen
Full Biography