Results for "guitar"

Lee Waterman

Lee Waterman - Guitarist, Composer, Producer Lee is originally from New York, where his early interest in music was nurtured by his grandmother, a locally prominent classical pianist. At the age of nine he studied drums and later played in the school band. In his late teens, Lee took up guitar and Latin percussion. For the next several years he studied jazz guitar and music theory with internationally known guitarist and author, Warren Nunes. This strong foundation in the classic jazz styles plus the multicultural influences of percussion studies forged his eclectic compositional style. Among his credits, Lee has led several Bay-Area based combos throughout the last three decades, has performed with sax great John Handy, Vocalist Mark Murphy, and Narada Michael Walden and opened for many headliners, including Tito Puente and Pancho Sanchez.

Kazumi Watanabe

Born: October 14, 1953

Kazumi Watanabe lives up to his name as the Japan’s world-class, top jazz guitarist. His quick tempo weaves fascinating ad libs and affluent melodies; he has been noted for elaborately combining various performing techniques and infusing rich expressive power to each and every note to create a one-of-a-kind “Kazumi Sound”. He has made the world his stage for over 40 years, transgressing genres and borders to perform with an outstanding number of domestic and international artists. The natural-born improviser also builds a unique world of composition and arrangements, always pioneering frontier instrumental music. Born 1953 in Tokyo, Kazumi Watanabe took the piano at the tender age of seven, but picked up the guitar at age 12 inspired by the Ventures

Frank Vignola

Born: December 30, 1965

An extremely versatile jazz guitarist, Frank Vignola has demonstrated that he is capable of playing everything from fusion and commercial pop-jazz to hard bop, post-bop, and swing. The native New Yorker has a wide variety of influences; everyone from Wes Montgomery, Joe Pass, and Pat Metheny to Django Reinhardt and Charlie Christian has affected his playing in some way. For Vignola, different influences have asserted themselves at different times — the Reinhardt or Christian influence might be especially prominent in a swing environment, whereas he has sometimes sounded more Metheny-ish in fusion or pop-jazz/NAC settings

Jimmie Vaughan

Born: March 20, 1951

When it comes to the blues today, there are a handful of guiding lights to make sure the music stays true to its powerful source. The sound of pleasure and pain that first sparked musicians to create such a sound is a force that can never be underestimated. The mojo has to be there. For Jimmie Vaughan, he's dedicated his life to making sure the blues not only stays alive, but remains full of life and an inspiration to all who listen. It's a spirit he holds close to him, and for over 50 years of holding the blues close inside him, Vaughan isn't about to stop now.

Jimmie Vaughan's new album, BABY, PLEASE COME HOME, is a rolling and righteous celebration of everything the blues can be

Stevie Ray Vaughan

Born: October 3, 1954

Stephen "Stevie" Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954 - August 27, 1990), born in Dallas, Texas, was an American blues guitarist. His broad appeal made him one of the world's most influential electric blues guitarists. In 2003, Rolling Stone magazine ranked Stevie Ray Vaughan #7 in their list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time. He was the younger brother of Jimmie Vaughan.

Vaughan was born and raised in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas, Texas. Neither of his parents had any strong musical talent but were avid music fans. They would take Vaughan and his older brother Jimmie to concerts to see Fats Domino, Jimmy Reed, and Bob Wills. Even though Vaughan initially wanted to play the drums as his primary instrument, he was given a guitar when he was eight years old. Vaughan's brother, Jimmie Vaughan, gave him his first guitar lessons. Vaughan later quoted in Guitar Player Magazine as saying, "My brother Jimmie actually was one of the biggest influences on my playing. He really was the reason why I started to play, watching him and seeing what could be done."

George Van Eps

Born: August 7, 1913

George Van Eps was a quiet legend among jazz guitarists, one who as far back as the 1930s pioneered a harmonically sophisticated chordal/lead style that was eclipsed in influence by the single-string idioms of Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt. Yet Van Eps, like his brassy colleague Les Paul, also stood apart from them as an iconoclastic inventor, designing a seven-string guitar in the late 1930s that adds an extra bass string. Thus, Van Eps was able to play bass lines simultaneously with chords and lead solos, a jazz equivalent of fingerpicking country guitarists like Merle Travis and Chet Atkins

Phil Upchurch

Born: July 19, 1941

A prolific guitarist whose distinctively funky, blues-steeped jazz style has graced well over a thousand recordings across the popular music spectrum, the legendary Phil Upchurch has also recorded 27 albums of his own leadership, as well as movie soundtracks. Jazz enthusiasts love and respect Phil Upchurch for his singular approach to composition. In developing his sound, Phil demonstrates no allegiance to any of his contemporaries and is indisputably one of the best in his field. He goes from classical to jazz to contemporary funk as easy as walking from one room to another. He is also an amazing electric bassist. In honor of Upchurch’s instrumental mastery, D’Angelico Guitars is soon to release a Second Edition of his signature Phil Upchurch Guitar. Adding to his media profile is Phil’s newfound second career as a fresh face for television advertising. Phil's most recent on-camera commercials have been Secured Horizon, "AARP," Tropicana and Verizon Wireless. He also has had, Cameo film appearances in, “His Eyes Are Watching God” and White Men Can’t Jump” to name a few.

James Blood Ulmer

Born: February 8, 1940

Free jazz has not produced many notable guitarists. Experimental musicians drawn to the guitar have had few jazz role models; consequently, they've typically looked to rock-based players for inspiration. James "Blood" Ulmer is one of the few exceptions—an outside guitarist who has forged a style based largely on the traditions of African-American vernacular music. Ulmer is an adherent of saxophonist/composer Ornette Coleman's vaguely defined Harmolodic theory, which essentially subverts jazz's harmonic component in favor of freely improvised, non-tonal, or quasi-modal counterpoint. Ulmer plays with a stuttering, vocalic attack; his lines are frequently texturally and chordally based, inflected with the accent of a soul-jazz tenor saxophonist. That's not to say his sound is untouched by the rock tradition—the influence of Jimi Hendrix on Ulmer is strong—but it's mixed with blues, funk, and free jazz elements. The resultant music is an expressive, hard-edged, loudly amplified hybrid that is, at its best, on a level with the finest of the Harmolodic school.

Ike Turner

Born: November 5, 1931

2001 marked the Golden Anniversary of a GOLD Record from an Era when Fifty-thousand 45’s was a BIG Seller. That 500K-selling single cut the edge of a new style before deejay Alan Freed named it: ROCK & ROLL. Sam Phillips, Sun Studios founder, tagged that Billboard #1 R&B Smash as the very first "Rock & Roll Recording". Every hell-raiser, hip-shaker, and hit-maker owes a nod to that teenager recognized by Rock historians as the "Father of Rock & Roll".

That Billboard bullet, "Rocket 88", was penned by a 19-year old boogie-woogie boy and his back-up band, "The Kings of Rhythm", for their first Sun Studios session in March 1951. B.B. King introduced the kid to Phillips, but he did not have a song - yet. So, on that rainy ride up Highway 61 to Memphis with their gear strapped on top, inspiration and lightening struck. The first muscle car - a highway cruiser - the hot, new, Oldsmobile "Rocket 88" was the subject and title of that historic #1 Hit. His lead vocalist, Jackie Brensten, and his side band, "The Delta Cats", were mistakenly credited with the song by Chess Records, who released it. But those that know Rock history know The Kings of Rhythm were the real rockers toiling in the shadows of their own success. That kid is referred to by Little Richard as "The Man". B.B. King proudly echoes, "He’s the best band leader I‘ve ever seen." The kid who became "The Man" is Ike Turner.

Tuck & Patti

For nearly three decades, this unique vocal/guitar jazz duo has cast its passionate musical spell worldwide, capturing the hearts of lovers, the respect of jazz buffs, and the jaw-dropping awe of guitarists.

With 29 years of performing together, and 26 years of marriage, the devotion forged by this extraordinary couple shows no sign of dimming from the pressure of familiarity. For them, this pressure creates more diamond than dust. Their instinct for refining their music, their technique and their career"their home studio makeover"their house and garden renovation"never wavers from their credo: It's not done if it's not from the heart. And what comes from the heart demands excellence.