This cowgirl and Western poet was very at home on the range
Liz Masterson, the Denver cowgirl and yodeler who performed everywhere from the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., to her beloved Colorado Cowboy Poetry Gathering during the National Western Stock Show, knew how to lighten up a crowd.
“She and her Cactus Crooners showed up at the Denver Sporting Club in 1984 to play this private party, and the whole thing almost seemed like a theater production,” said Tom Scharf, former CEO of Swallow Hill Music Association, of his first impression of Masterson. “They had on these colorful Western costumes and were in character the whole time. It was extraordinary.”
Countless others would have similar encounters with Masterson, who died at home at the age of 71 on Dec. 30, following a fiveyear battle with ovarian cancer.
As a musician, the “Songbird of the Sage” toured the country keeping the traditional cowboy-and-cowgirl flame lit, while recording 10 albums — six with her late partner, Sean Blackburn — including “Hills of Early Morn,’ ” released last month.
“Liz was a great singer and writer, and was just about the best entertainer in the truest sense of the word,” said musician and longtime friend Mollie O’Brien. “She was just as hilarious off stage as on, and was the life of every party and pretty much always the last to leave.”
To celebrate Masterson’s life and career — which included national tours, awards from the Western Music Association (which she helped create) and collaborations with Country Music Hall of Famer Patsy Montana, Rex Allen and Don Edwards — friends will gather at 2 p.m. Sunday at the American Mountaineering Center in Golden, 710 10th St. The event is open to the public.
“If you listen to an hour of country music, all the songs except maybe one will be about being drunk and being cheated on, cheating on somebody else, a broken heart,” Masterson told The Denver Post in a 2010 profile. “Mostly dysfunction and infidelity, being bitter and angry and upset. Cowboy music is about outdoors, friendship, riding down the canyon, happy trails.”
Born Elizabeth Grace Snider in Denver on Dec. 8, 1946, Masterson graduated from East High School in 1965 and Colorado State University in 1970 with a degree in physical education and dance, with nary a thought of becoming a musician.
Instead of becoming a teacher — as originally planned — she worked a succession of jobs including waitress, bartender and bank teller.
After a marriage and amicable divorce, she “embarked blindly on a music career, knowing nothing about the business and little about music,” Masterson once said. “How hard could it be, right?”
Masterson also became a champion yodeler, even appearing in a 2006 episode of the show “MythBusters,” in which she attempted to trigger an avalanche in Telluride by yodeling (for better or worse, the myth was “busted.”)
Even after her cancer diagnosis she continued touring and performing, including recording an album with guitarist Mike Dowling called “Linger Awhile” while she was on oxygen treatments.
The night she died, O’Brien and another musician went to her home and played music until about 1 a.m.
“I sang the Buffy SaintMarie song ‘Piney Wood Hills’ and afterwards said, ‘That was for Liz. I love that song and know she does, too.’ She opened her eyes and said, ‘I recorded that on my CD ‘Roads To Colorado’ in 2008.’ ”