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Lise Liddell, home
Lise Liddell on the Pont Alexandre III in Paris, in a black vest, white blouse and red shoes, beneath a bronze lamp post.

Lise Liddell

Songwriter, essayist and poet
from Houston and Austin, Texas.

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On Untrodden Ways

I have found that when I sink into the buried tremors of myself, the suffering and the beauty arise as twins, and they are equally as excruciating, equally as sacred.

Lise Liddell
Album cover of Untrodden Ways.

Untrodden Ways

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Writing

Five true stories, from a tequila road trip in 1984 to the small painting her father left her.

Lise Liddell in red glasses at her bookshelves.

Long prose

Poetry RingsWhen I was a child my father, Frank, relished reciting poetry…HurricaneIn August of 2008, Anderson Cooper was a no-show for Hurricane Ike in Houston.Tequila NostalgiaMy greatest tequila memory - and considering how much of it I drank I am surprised I have any recollection of it at all – spawned itself when my…

Short prose

My Father's DementiaMy father’s dementia arrived bearing gifts: the politicians, once the catalysts of verbal rampages at televised Fox News reports, dance holding…Freezing TimeDeath has taken another friend.

A poetry book and a new album
are on the way.

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Lise smiling in red lipstick, sitting on the floor in sparkly boots.Lise by candlelight against gold-patterned wallpaper.Lise crouched on an old wooden staircase in a red silk blouse.Lise lit in neon blue and pink.

About Lise

When Lise was 26 years old, she broke up with her boyfriend of three years. Having been raised in a regimented social world in Houston, TX some of her friends expressed concern for her self-imposed marital status at such a late age. Not too long after that, she quit her job as an oil and gas banking analyst, throwing away a lucrative, respectable career to join a tiny theater located literally on the wrong side of a specific railroad track. Her father, deeming that she’d reduced her life to an embarrassing disgrace, had a whole herd of not-just-regular-cows, but Texas Longhorns. As did a few other family members and friends who loved her.

Lise then began writing songs and performing them in dive bars around Houston, and eventually all over Texas. She started making records, going as far as Australia to make, “In the Wake,” but finding her creative comfort zone in Austin, TX with producer Mark Hallman who understood her unique approach to writing music and lyrics that did not fit into any category.

Eventually her family and friends forgot to worry about her. At least as far as she knows.

Her latest release includes songs written with Mr. Hallman. The double vinyl album includes a 1798 Wordsworth poem that Lise set to music, and is the inspiration for the collection’s title, Untrodden Ways. Lise also writes prose and poetry, some of which you will find on this website.

A new album and a book of poetry are in the pipeline for release in 2027. The music and the writing on this site are free.