Tom Breiding is a former Music Row Staff writer, musical spokesperson for the United Mine Workers of America, the 2022 Hazel Dickens Art-Maker Award Recipient designated by the West Virginia Mine Wars Museum, and Director of the Clifford M. Lewis Appalachian Institute at Wheeling University. His Unbroken Circle: Songs of the West Virginia Coalfields spent 15 weeks in the top 100 of the Americana charts and brought the voices of union coal miners and their families to a national audience. Former Nashville Music Row staff writer, Tom has spent the entirety of his career as a chronicler of small town America and the past decade as a musician in residence for the United Mine Workers of America. In addition to providing the songs for the union’s “Fairness at Patriot” and “Keep the Promise” campaigns, Tom was commissioned by the United Mine Workers Union to write and perform original songs for the Ludlow Massacre Centennial, and the 50 year commemoration of the Farmington mine disaster.
