Bill Frisell
b. 18 March 1951, Baltimore, Maryland, USA. Frisell, whose father was a tuba and string-bass player, was raised in Denver, Colorado. He began playing clarinet, then saxophone, finally settling on guitar. He also plays banjo, ukulele and bass. He majored in music at North Colorado University (1969-71) and in 1977 was awarded a diploma in arranging and composition from Berklee College Of Music, as well as winning the Harris Stanton guitar award. He took lessons from Jim Hall, Johnny Smith and Dale Bruning, and his favourite players are Hall, Wes Montgomery and Jimi Hendrix. He has played with many major contemporary figures, including Eberhard Weber, Mike Gibbs, Jan Garbarek, Charlie Haden, Carla Bley, Julius Hemphill, Gunter Hampel, and John Scofield. Since the late '80s he has appeared with Ronald Shannon Jacksonand Melvin Gibbs (as Power Tools), John Zorn's harmolodic hardcore indulgence Naked City, the NEWS FOR LULU bebop trio with Zorn and George Lewis, the Paul Bley Quartet featuring John Surman and Paul Motian, Motian's trio with Frisell and Joe Lovano and his own band, which features the members of Naked City minus Zorn. Frisell's style makes use of electronics to produce long sustained notes with lots of vibrato and legato lines, possibly a legacy of his training as a reed player. He is equally convincing whether stitching feedback howls into the midst of violent Naked City melees or playing gentle country-influenced solo tunes, post-modern bottleneck blues or lop-sided melancholic ballads. Frisell's solo work found a wider audience wih the release of HAVE A LITTLE FAITH together with a lengthy (by his standards) tour.