Chris "Crispy" Ramey is a guitarist, pedal steel guitarist and clawhammer banjoist from West Virginia with over 25 years of professional music experience. Now residing in Boulder County, Colorado, Chris is "21 strings of psychedelic-country-funk-rock-reggae." His guitar playing has been described as a twanged-up Deadhead mix of Jeff Beck and Clarence White, while his pedal steel has been compared to "Sneaky" Pete Kleinow and Jerry Garcia. Chris' clawhammer banjo style is straight-up oldtime mountain music, but delivered with unexpected melodic and rhythmic twists.

As a performer Chris Ramey has been privileged to open for many national and international acts, including George Clinton and P-Funk, The Wailers, Burning Spear, Culture and Rusted Root. Past band memberships include Jolly Gargoyle, Joint Chiefs (co-founder), Rasta Rafiki, Other River Project (leader), Psycho Billy's, Tom Batchelor Band, Exit Strategy (leader), US Pipe, WD-40, Crowboy L-Town Allstars and Bonnie and the Clydes, Lil' Ween and Danny Shafer and the 21st Century..

Chris has done studio session work for a diverse range of artists, like the Tom Batchelor Band (reggae-rock), Crowboy (alt-country), Craig Corona (Americana), Bonnie and the Clydes (country), Full Belly (funk-rock-reggae) and Danny Shafer (singer-songwriter).

Chris also performs solo melodic clawhammer banjo shows, with September 2010 marking the release of "West Virginia Girls - Solo Melodic Clawhammer Banjo." This online collection for melodic clawhammer banjo includes five traditional fiddle tunes and one original composition. The audio tracks AND companion clawhammer banjo tablature and notation book are both available at the Chris Ramey Music Store.

Recently Chris has begun a new project, Chris Ramey's Not Dead Yet, featuring original tunes and early Dead and Dead-related material. Here's a performance of "Operator." 

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