NPR features singer-songwriter working in the rural West

Kirk Siegler reports for NPR from Boise, Idaho, about Margo Cilker, a country singer based in the inland northwest.  Here's an excerpt:  

Margo Cilker's songs bring listeners to the West's more forgotten places: from the 99 freeway through California farm country south to Tehachapi Pass to the north and Jordan Valley, Ore.

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The lack of live gigs over the past two years was especially tough on up-and-coming musicians from smaller cities and towns like Cilker. But in the end it may have leveled the playing field some.

"I was one of the lucky ones to come out of the pandemic with more of an opportunity in the industry," Cilker says.

Originally from the suburban Bay Area in California, Cilker has spent most of her burgeoning career based in the rural Northwest from remote eastern Oregon to eastern Washington, where her husband works as a ranch hand.

During the lockdowns, Cilker did odd jobs around the ranch and sometimes played live for the cowboys and the veterinarians. And she wrote, a lot. Everyone was remote and virtual and her rural life figured heavily into her music. It appears to have given her career an early boost.

The best paragraph:

"So many people are out there concentrated in big cities, and it shows in their writing," Cilker says. "It becomes in itself homogenous. I've never felt like I could move to Nashville or L.A., or New York. Nothing about it would feed my art."