The Accidentals

Guest Artists, Music

About The Accidentals

Long before glowing acclaim from NPR and Billboard, packed shows, unforgettable festival appearances, millions of streams, and collaborations with everyone from BTS to Kaboom Collective, the journey of The Accidentals commenced in a public high school classroom in Traverse City, MI. As the story goes, concertmaster violinist Savannah Buist and cellist Katie Larson raised their hands at the request for volunteers to play a music boosters concert and wound up being musical soulmates.

Sav and Katie transferred to Interlochen Arts Academy for the remainder of high school and completed a successful crowdfunding campaign to release Bittersweet only a year later. Shortly after, they met Michael Dause at Blissfest and welcomed him behind the kit as their full-time percussionist, cementing the lineup.

As high school ended, the band began nonstop touring, playing 200+ shows a year at such festivals as Electric Forest, Rocky Mountain Folk Fest, Summerfest, and SXSW, and on stages with the likes of Brandi Carlile, The Wailers, Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie, Andrew Bird, Martin Sexton, Rusted Root, The Decemberists, and more.

The Accidentals now host and lead workshops across the country, hoping to inspire other young musicians. They opened a nonprofit in 2020 called Play It Forward, Again and Again, to help provide access to instruments, lessons, and mentors for all aspiring musician

Following the 2016 release of Parking Lot EP, Huffington Post touted The Accidentals among its “Sweet 16 of 2016.” Billboard called them “the band to watch.”

The band wrote “Marrow” for the award-winning movie, Almost Home. “Michigan and Again” showed up on an episode of The Boys on Amazon Prime Video.

They have collaborated with the likes of Tom Paxton, Kim Richey, Dar Williams, Maia Sharp, Mary Gauthier, and Jaimee Harris. In 2018, The Accidentals began work on their fourth full-length album, Vessel.