Musician who helped revive American folk music, Mike Seeger, dies at 75 in Va. of cancer

Folk music revivalist Mike Seeger dies at 75

LEXINGTON, Va. —Mike Seeger, who helped revive traditional American folk music, has died at age 75.

Seeger’s wife, Alexia Smith, said Monday that Seeger died of cancer Friday night at their home in Lexington, Va.

Seeger was born in New York City and raised near Washington, D.C., in a musical family. Two of his siblings became key figures in the folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s: his half brother, Pete, and sister Peggy.

Mike Seeger associated with traditional musicians such as Maybelle Carter and Dock Boggs.

He sang and played a number of instruments, including banjo, fiddle and guitar, and helped form the traditional music group The New Lost City Ramblers in 1958. He recorded more than 40 albums solo and with others, and received six Grammy Award nominations.