Brennan Gilmore


Brennan Gilmore is a musician and former United States Foreign Service Officer. As a musician and bandleader he has originated and performed in a number of musical groups. He was raised in Lexington, Virginia and attended the University of Virginia, studying international relations as an Echols Scholar, graduating in 2001. He currently resides in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Gilmore served as chief of staff for Tom Perriello's campaign for governor in Virginia. He currently serves as senior director for Clean Virginia, and works in rural workforce development, bringing IT opportunities to "underserved communities" in rural Virginia. He teaches as adjunct faculty at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia.
Gilmore was present for a protest rally in Charlottesville on August 12, 2017 that turned violent. His film of a car ramming participants led to accusations and threats, damages for some of which he is now suing in court.

Diplomatic career

Gilmore joined the United States Foreign Service in 2002, shortly after finishing college, serving 15 years in several African countries, including Tunisia. He also served at postings in Democratic Republic of the Congo, Central African Republic, Sudan, and Sierra Leone — and domestically from the State Department in Washington, D.C. He was Deputy Chief of Mission in Central African Republic. His service in Africa was curtailed by a closing of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Bangui in 2012 due to security concerns. Gilmore served as Russ Feingold and Tom Perriello's top aide in their postings as U.S. Special Envoy to the African Great Lakes Region. He is currently on long-term unpaid leave from the Department of State.

Political activism

Brennan Gilmore's grandfather, John Middlemas, a 97-year-old World War II veteran, "took a knee" in support of NFL players protesting the national anthem, saying, "Those kids have every right to protest." Gilmore "knew it was a powerful image" of his relative kneeling, and posted it to his Twitter account. His grandfather's activism was inspired by his own New Zealand relative, a British settler "who spoke out against 'mean and nasty' treatment of the Maori 150 years ago." Gilmore's aunt Maile Auterson, who heads a community gardens organization in Missouri and descends from a long line of Ozarks farmers, claims "they are a family of Democrats".
Gilmore served as chief of staff for Tom Perriello's Democratic campaign for Virginia governor in 2017 and formed a musical group from his friends known as Perriello's Pickers to help get the political message across. His latest group, Wild Common, echoes a poem by D. H. Lawrence titled "The Wild Common" which laments the loss of natural environment:
Gilmore has been an outspoken critic of Dominion Energy. He current serves as a senior director of Clean Virginia, an organization established to limit the influence of monopoly energy utility Dominion Energy in Virginia politics. As Gilmore stated about legislation Dominion sponsored, "these are convenient ways to open the door to deregulation and overcharging the customer." He has also opposed two natural gas pipelines proposed for Virginia, performing with his group Wild Common at a protest event to block them, stating:
In his role at Wize Solutions, he promotes rural workforce development in the southwest region of Virginia. The college course Gilmore teaches at James Madison University as adjunct faculty, "Political Protest and Civil Engagement", looks at the role of protests in a democracy. His attendance at the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville on August 12, 2017 was motivated by his desire to counter the evil he saw gathering there. As he explained to Judy Woodruff in an interview on PBS:

Charlottesville rally

Gilmore was present at the protest rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in August 2017, where he filmed the automobile ramming participants. He subsequently was the target of accusations and threats regarding his role in the incident. Gilmore says threats came in on Twitter and Facebook like: "You're a dead man walking. You're a CIA operative. You work for George Soros or Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton... we're coming for you. We know where you are." In an interview with NPR, Gilmore stated:
Gilmore and his family have suffered other consequences. Gilmore is now pursuing damages from media outlets in court. The complaint, filed March 13, 2018 by Georgetown Law's Civil Rights Clinic on behalf of Gilmore, names Alex Jones of InfoWars, Lee Stranahan formerly of Breitbart News, and former Florida congressman Allen West as defendants, along with Jim Hoft of The Gateway Pundit. It was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Virginia Charlottesville Division. In a statement, Gilmore said of the defendants named in his suit:
The controversy also affected Gilmore's relationship with musicians he admired. As he describes it, "People really distanced themselves from me and even condemned me that I grew up playing music with."

Musician career

Growing up in Lexington, Gilmore benefited from, and was influenced by the many other established musicians in the area, including Will Lee, Larry Keel, Mike Seeger, and Gary and Rooster Ruley. He is a multi-instrumentalist — performing on guitar, mandolin, banjo, and violin — and singer, who often provides lead vocals. Since forming Concordia Discors in high school, he has originated a number musical groups. As a songwriter, Foreign service assignments to Africa "have provided plenty of inspiration" for his original tunes. His "Kakuma" released in 2008 "delivers a chilling tale of a conflict zone in Sudan from a Blue Ridge front porch." As Gilmore states:

Walker's Run

In 1997 Gilmore of Lexington, Virginia gathered musicians from his hometown and from the University of Virginia to create the band Walker's Run, which "built a loyal regional following for its high-energy hoedowns." Musically the group combined Rockbridge County mountain music, Blue Ridge bluegrass, and the indie rock experience of Gilmore's high school band. In the newgrass vein, Walker's Run performs traditional bluegrass material in a hard-charging style, pushing the edges into other genres such as jazz, blues, reggae, and even rock. As Gilmore states, "There's a roughness to the music. Our sound is more raw mountain music than cleaner traditional bluegrass." They often perform Gilmore originals mixed with bluegrass covers of Beatles tunes and those by reggae star Bob Marley. The group stopped playing full-time in 2002 when Gilmore joined the Foreign Service, coming together for "sporadic" reunions since. They released a six-song EP titled Live at Lime Kiln from a summer performance at "the idyllic outdoor theater in Lexington" in 2008 — their first recording since 2000.

Kantara

After serving in Africa with the U.S. Foreign Service, Gilmore created the musical group Kantara, an Arab-Appalachian collaboration that earned him an award from the U.S. Secretary of State for its cultural impact. As Gilmore states: "A couple of old fiddle tunes have now become oud and darbouka tunes." Kantara means "bridge" in Arabic. Joining him in this project were other members of Walker's Run, including violinist Ann Marie Calhoun.

Borden Grant

Gilmore started "alt-country-soul band" Borden Grant, named for the provision of land by King George II of Great Britain on which Rockbridge County, Virginia was later situated, who appeared at the Theater at Lime Kiln in Lexington in September 2010 with Ryan Chiachiere, Zack Blatter, Rob "Rubs" Hubbard, and Bryan Holmes. The group fuses "melodic rock, traditional Scots-Irish ballads, and Stax/Volt soul."

Wild Common

Gilmore's new group, Wild Common, appeared at the "Water is Life Rally & Concert" in Richmond, Virginia on December 2, 2017. The group earlier performed at a "welcoming Obama to Virginia" rally — where the 44th U.S. president spoke in support of Democrat Ralph Northam in "Virginia's high-stakes gubernatorial election" on October 19, 2017. Tom Perriello, whose campaign for Virginia governor Gilmore served on, expressed excitement at attending the February 17, 2018 Charlottesville debut of the "genre-defying New Appalachian band" with his "old bus-ride seat mate" Davina Jackson as lead vocalist. In addition to Gilmore on guitar and vocals, the group features: Davina Jackson, Nate Leath, Dhara Goradia, and Rob Hubbard.
While serving as chief of staff for Tom Perriello's gubernatorial campaign in 2017, Gilmore formed the Perriello Pickers, a bluegrass band which included musicians from Walker's Run, e.g., Nate Leath on violin, Will Lee on banjo, Andy Thacker on mandolin, and Zack Blatter on bass. Jay Starling, son of The Seldom Scene founder John Starling, played "dobro banjo" and Gilmore himself played guitar. They went into the studio with Davina Jackson, a gospel singer Perriello attended elementary school with, to record a new version of their "official campaign anthem".

Articles written

In 2006 Brennan Gilmore won the prestigious Secretary of State's Award for Public Outreach from the U.S. State Department for "ground-breaking efforts to engage non-traditional audiences and promote Arab-American cultural understanding through music" after founding Kantara — a musical group that creates an "alchemy of Appalachian old-time and bluegrass and North African melodies and rhythms" — and touring the world with it.