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Gaelynn Lea

Biography

Gaelynn Lea

Gaelynn Lea is a composer, musician and disability rights advocate. Since winning NPR Music’s Tiny Desk Contest in 2016, she has captivated audiences around the world with her haunting original songs and traditional fiddle tunes. Gaelynn has collaborated with Michael Stipe, The Decemberists and Wilco. In 2022, Gaelynn composed an original score for Macbeth on Broadway, starring Daniel Craig and Ruth Negga. She later released an album featuring these compositions, titled Music From Macbeth. Music aside, Gaelynn Lea is a sought-after public speaker about disability culture, inclusion and accessibility in the arts. She was awarded a Disability Futures Fellowship in 2024.

Gaelynn Lea

Books by Gaelynn Lea

It Wasn't Meant to Be Perfect: A Memoir
by Gaelynn Lea - Memoir, Nonfiction

Gaelynn Lea was born with Osteogenesis Imperfecta. Her parents were loving, cash-strapped theater kids, and she grew up racing about in her first electric wheelchair, having adventures with her siblings and handing out Playbills at her parents' dinner theater shows. Transfixed by an orchestra performance in fifth grade, Gaelynn was determined to play the cello. When her shortened limbs made playing the instrument challenging, she employed a familiar tactic: adapting. What if she held a violin upright in her wheelchair, like the world's tiniest cello? That what if was the key that unlocked her lifelong music career. Lea's warm, funny, deeply felt memoir addresses love and faith, sexuality and mortality, the frustration and the joy of difference. She shows how disability inspires and enables unique and indispensable contributions to the world.