Kim Gentry at the Crystal Theatre — Woody Guthrie Folk Festival

Singer-Songwriter takes 2^nd Prize in Woody Guthrie Songwriting Contest

I want to use any lit­tle bit of tal­ent that is in me, even if that tal­ent is not as great as some­one else’s. It took a long time for me to have the courage to come to that, though; to be will­ing to risk expos­ing my flaws and imper­fec­tion in order to cre­ate. But I believe there is room for every­one to con­tribute their own spe­cial gifts. We become par­a­lyzed when we com­pare our gifts to others.

One half of brother-sis­ter duo Berteal, Kim Gentry made her Woodyfest debut at the Crystal Theatre this past July, in a short show­case hon­or­ing her 2^nd place show­ing in the Woody Guthrie song­writ­ing con­test. The young Indiana native also received her artist’s cre­den­tials from pre­sen­ter Bill McCloud, a famil­iar face to long­time festivalgoers.

Gentry is a multi-instru­men­tal­ist and writes and sings all of her band’s songs, with her brother Chad claim­ing writ­ing co-credit on some of their mate­r­ial. Chad also plays gui­tar, sings har­mony, and writes the musi­cal arrange­ments. In addi­tion to Gentry’s song­writ­ing prize, Berteal were rec­og­nized as the Best Group/​Duo in the 2012 International Acoustic Music Awards, hon­ored as final­ists in the USA Songwriting Competition [Sidenote: Berteal’s high marks at the USA Songwriting Competition earned them a per­for­mance at SXSW.] , and show­cased in 2013 at Nashville’s famous Bluebird Café. The pair are rais­ing funds for a 6 song EP; you can con­tribute at their GoFundMe page.

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