Nominated for WAMMIE Awards for Songwriter of the Year, Best Contemporary Folk Vocalist, Best Folk Contemporary Folk Duo/Group (with Cletus Kennelly), Best Folk Contemporary Recording ("Be the Missing Peace"), and Song of the Year ("Love on the Metro" with Cletus Kennelly).

Also nominated for Songwriter of the Year, Best Contemporary Folk Vocalist, and Best Folk Contemporary Folk Duo/Group (with Cletus Kennelly).

Also nominated for Best Contemporary Folk Vocalist.

Nominated for WAMMIE Awards for Best Contemporary Female Folk Vocalist, Best Contemporary Folk Recording (LOTUS with Cletus Kennelly), .

Lori was also nominated for Best Contemporary Folk Vocalist, which Cletus won along with Mary Sue Twohy (Huzzah!) 

Lori received two "WAMMIE" Awards - 2003 Songwriter of the Year and 2003 Song of the Year ("It Was a Great Day" from her latest CD, Like Sea Glass).  

Overall, Lori was nominated for seven 2003 WAMMIE awards - Songwriter of the Year, Album of the Year (Like Sea Glass), Song of the Year ("It Was a Great Day"), Best Country Recording (Like Sea Glass), Record Design (Like Sea Glass with Richard Dahl), as Best Contemporary Folk Vocalist, and, along with Cletus Kennelly, as Best Duo/Group in Contemporary Folk.  

Lori received the 2003 Mid-Atlantic Songwriters Contest Overall Best Song Award for "It Was a Great Day" from her Like Sea Glass CD.  Lori also was awarded the Gold in the 2003 MASC Country category for "It Was a Great Day."  

Lori was selected to attend the 2007 Jeffrey Steele Songwriters' Bootcamp, where she was mentored by #1 Hit Songwriter, Jeffrey Steele.  Along with recording his own material, Jeff is a prolific Nashville songwriter, having co-written more than sixty hit songs for such artists as Montgomery Gentry, Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, LeAnn Rimes, Rascal Flatts, Van Zant, and many other top name acts.  His cuts include Tim McGraw's "The Cowboy in Me," Diamond Rio's "Unbelievable," Rascal Flatts' "These Days," Faith Hill's "When the Lights Go Down," Trace Adkins' "Chrome," LeAnn Rimes' "Big Deal," as well as Montgomery Gentry's "Speed," "Hell Yeah" and "My Town."

Lori performs in the Washington, DC, area with local songwriter Cletus Kennelly, and with Twice Shy. Lori has shared the stage with Nashville hit songwriters Pat Alger (co-wrote “The Thunder Rolls” with Garth Brooks), Tia Sillers & Mark D. Sanders (Lee Ann Womack’s 2001 Song of the Year, “I Hope You Dance”), Mark Selby (co-wrote Dixie Chicks hit “There’s Your Trouble”), and Steve Key (Kathy Mattea’s “Record Time (33, 45, 78)”).

Lori grew up in Arizona, California, and Florida. She learned to play guitar at age 11, and began writing songs as a teenager. Lori attended Broward Community College, Arizona Western College, and graduated from Northern Arizona University with a bachelor’s degree in Music Education with emphasis on vocal performance. Lori’s professional career began in New York City in a small band called “Main Squeeze.” 

Lori returned to northern Virginia in 1999, where she continues her solo acoustic performances and occasional collaborations with local performing songwriters in various Virginia, Maryland, and District of Columbia locales. She recently released her third CD, Like Sea Glass.Following on their first album's success, Lori, Michelle, and Butch, now collectively known as Twice Shy, pooled their creative vibes for their latest release, entitled "Once Twice Shy."   

In the fall of 2000, Lori met fellow DC-area performing songwriter, Cletus Kennelly, and stalked him incessently until he relented and agreed to allow her to sing harmony on his songs, which she obsessively memorized within a week.  By 2001, Lori had cracked Cletus's steely resolve and they became an "unofficial duo."  In 2005, their duo CD, LOTUS, bloomed.  Lori and Cletus are currently working on a new release (if they don't kill one another first, which would be both sad and an end to some flat-out beautiful harmonies.)

In July 2003, Lori played at the Kennedy Center's Millennium Stage, backed by Cletus.  They reprised their Millennium Stage performance to a standing room only audience in 2006.  To view the performances, click the photos below.

For reviews of Lori's music and performances, click here.

Read an article on Lori's Songwriting from the Loudoun Times