Steve Tannen

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Steve Tannen bigraphy, stories - American singer songwriter

Steve Tannen : biography

1968 –

Steven J. "Steve" Tannen (born 1968) is an American singer-songwriter. He is best known for being in the folk-pop duo The Weepies.

Discography

Year Title Label
2000 Big Señorita Independent
2003 Stopped At a Green Light Independent

Early life and career

Tannen was born in New York City, but grew up in Australia and Canada in addition to New York. He started performing at an early age and learned music at home. He is the grandson of magician Louis Tannen. He is the brother of songwriter Greg Tannen and screenwriter Robert Tannen.

Steve graduated from Mamaroneck High School. He received a degree in English from Stanford University.http://www.answers.com/topic/steve-tannen Tannen worked as a production assistant in Hollywood, becoming a script reader and assistant to film director Norman Jewison.http://www.allmusic.com/artist/steve-tannen-p434284 He interned at radio station KCRW, and then moved to Colorado to work for the Computational and Information Systems Laboratory (CISL) at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). He left NCAR after a year and worked odds jobs around the US, developing a personal mix of folk and rock.

He returned to New York and, with the help from former Suzanne Vega guitarist Jon Gordon, started a rock and roll project.http://setlists.vega.net/band/jgordon.htm This turned into his debut album "Big Señorita" which was chosen as one of Performing Songwriter Magazine’s Top 12 Independent Releases of 2001. In 2001, while touring behind Big Senorita, Tannen met his future wife and musical partner Deb Talan at a show at Club Passim in Boston, Massachusetts. His second solo CD "Stopped at a Green Light" was released in September 2003; this was quickly followed by the first Weepies album Happiness in December of that same year.

In addition to The Weepies’ albums, Talan and Tannen collaborated with singer/actress Mandy Moore on her 2007 album Wild Hope. Together, they wrote and recorded five songs with Mandy — the single "Extraordinary," the title track "Wild Hope," "All Good Things," "Few Days Down" and "Looking Forward to Looking Back."

Steve is also a member of The Tannen Brothers, in which he plays with his brother Greg Tannen.