Ruthie Foster is an American singer/songwriter of blues and folk music. She is from Gause, Texas and from a family of gospel singers. She studied music at McLennan Community College and then worked in the US Navy, where she started performing. Her debut was released in 1997 and she has performed in North America, Europe and Australia. She has often been compared to Ella Fitzgerald and Aretha Franklin.
Vin Garbutt (born in South Bank, Middlesbrough, United Kingdom), though second generation Irish, is an English folk singer and songwriter. A signifant part of his repertoire consists of protest songs covering topics such as "the Troubles" in Northern Ireland (Troubles of Erin), unemployment, and abortion. At the age of 21, in 1969, he threw caution to the winds and became a professional musician. Armed with the rich repertoire of songs he had amassed, he spent the first summer busking his way around the bars of Spain's Mediterranean coast, and on to Morocco via Gibraltar.