About Paul Bliss: provided 2013

Paul Ferron Bliss is a renowned and well respected cowboy poet who lives the Western lifestyle from his "headquarters" in Salem, Utah, on a small ranch at the foot of the Wasatch Mountains. Paul, wife Stacy—an accomplished horsewoman— and their two children operate a cow/calf and heifer development program and enjoy traveling to regional poetry and music gatherings where Paul performs.

A former three-time High School Rodeo finalist, Paul has cowboyed throughout the Great Basin—from the Arizona Strip to the high mountain valleys of Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming. As a rancher, trail boss, and Wagon Master, Paul has dedicated his life to preserving Western culture.

In 1999, Paul founded the Utah Western Heritage Foundation and has since planned, organized, and led several re-enactment wagon trains across the West, including numerous trips from his hometown in Salem to Kanab while herding a 100-head remuda—a distance of over 290 miles! He was the Wagon Master on a wagon train that departed from Spanish Fork, Utah, and traveled a distance of over 800 miles on the Old Spanish Trail to San Bernardino, California in 2001 for that city's sesquicentennial (150 year) celebration. Another year, he rode his horse and led 2 pack horses all the way from home to the Elko Poetry Gathering in January, with most of the trip in blizzard and deep snow.

Paul's poetry has been published in the Las Vegas and Der Spiegel magazines, and in The Big Roundup. His poetry has been recorded in Elko, Nevada and on Hal Cannon's Christmas in Lapland as well as numerous local broadcasts. He is a past winner of the National Cowboy Poetry Rodeo (2011) and the Western Music Association Utah Chapter's Serious Poet of the Year in both 2001 and 2002. In March of 2013, Brigham Young University's Modern Dance Ensemble created and performed a choreographed production to a sold-out crowd based on Paul's poem, "Cowboy Poetry in Motion."

With his newest CD, Pure Bliss, released in 2013, Paul inherits a new title as singer/songwriter in this fast- growing Western genre which he has helped to grow and find wide acceptance. More comfortable on the range than in town, Paul still considers himself "just a cowboy."