For bassist Vickie Vaughn, music is all about home.
Even a casual fan of the reigning, three-time IBMA Bass Player of the Year knows just how important Kentucky, family, and home are to Vaughn. Between them, they’ve colored every aspect of the bassist-singer-songwriter’s lifelong career in music.
Born and raised near Paducah, Vaughn grew up singing and playing bass at churches, community events, and a local country revue show in western Kentucky. She moved to Nashville as a teenager to study at Belmont University, utilizing her college years – as so many Nashville-based undergrads do – as a foot in the door of Music Row.
Fast forward to the fall of 2023, she bested a handful of her own heroes – Todd Phillips, Mark Schatz, Mike Bub, and Missy Raines – to win the coveted Bass Player of the Year trophy, her very first IBMA Award. Then, in 2024, she repeated her incredible IBMA feat, earning another Bass Player of the Year honor, back-to-back.
In 2025, she won in a “three-peat,” yet again taking home the trophy thanks to votes from her peers and colleagues in the bluegrass industry. The audiences at each year’s IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards roared as her name was announced, shaking the gilded performing arts center.
As a member of trailblazing and globe-trotting female ensemble Della Mae, an in-demand artist in her own right finalizing her debut solo album, and a ceaselessly popular side-musician across many roots genres, Vaughn demonstrates how a boundaryless, loving personal community can be purely reflected in a professional network.
Like everything Vaughn brings to bear, her album, Travel On, is a remarkable combination of styles, textures, and inspirations that all make perfect sense under the joyful and harlequin umbrella of her unique approach to roots music.
Learn more at www.vickievaughn.com.
Vickie Vaughn
- Saturday, September 26
- Songbirds, 206 W Main Street, Chattanooga
- Doors at 6:00 PM, Show at 7:00 PM
- Tickets: eventim.us/vickievaughn26