Non-keyboard influences?

[Dave Bryce]

So, who has influenced your music that isn't a keyboard player?

 

Songwriters? Musicians who play instruments other than keys?

 

It doesn't just have to be musicians - maybe certain pieces of art inspire you...or perhaps, there are certain people in your life that have changed your musical direction, or inspired you to creativity for some other reason.

 

One of my first huge influences was a left-handed bass player from Liverpool... http://cwm.ragesofsanity.com/s/net7/icon13.gif

 

dB

[Graham English]

Most definitely Jimi Hendrix. What else can I say? I'm also hugely inspired by horn players, especially the sax. Miles, Coltrane, and Michael Brecker to name just a few. I have to mention Prince because it's hard to categorize what he does- he does everything! I'm also musically inspired by a lot of singers- Prince, D'Angelo, Marvin Gaye. <--and I'm a rock musician!?

But aside from musical influences, my biggest influence has been the writings of Ken Wilber.

"The twenty-first century literally has three choices: Aristotle, Nietzsche, or Ken Wilber." -Jack Crettenden, Ph,D,

And there's many more amazing testimonials from where that came from. If anyone is interested in picking up one of his books, I would recommend either Grace and Grit, A Brief History of Everything, or A Theory of Everything.

And the coolest part is Ken lives in my town of Bolder, Colorado and I've gotten to become friends with him. Mind blowing I tell ya.

[sbrock1san.rr.com]

Jimmy Page(Led Zeppelin, The Firm) has always been important to me. The way he layers parts and includes various influences into his compositions has always impressed me. The way he went from folky acoustic stuff to bluesy, concrete riffs......sometimes in the same song. His stage presence was great too. No one has the right to look that cool and have that much swagger, AND back it up musically.

 

The unknown British group Marillion with Steve Hogarth on vocals has been my biggest influence for the last 13 years. A great mixture of thoughtful lyrics, progressive rock influences, and a big sense of drama. The fans aren't just casual listeners, they feel like the music is an important part of their lives.

[marino]

I'm really busy lately, so I don't post a lot, but this one is too good to pass. (Keep'em coming, Dave)

 

Many musicians of all kinds influenced my playing. What's important is what you play, regardless of your instrument. And of course, I listen to many different kinds of music for pleasure, even if I know I'll never have the chance or desire to play some of them. (For example, Raga, music from Central Africa, death metal, etc.)

 

BUT being a jazzer at heart, I am *directly* influenced by some of my favorite improvisers, just because I heard them a lot and studied their styles. A partial list of non keyboard players:

 

John McLaughlin (guitar) for his multimetrical writing style.

Allan Holdsworth (guitar): His fluid, elastic phrasing is a model and a goal for my synth playing.

Bob Berg (sax): His playing in the hard-bop groups of the '70s with Cedar Walton on piano really drove the other musicians on higher levels.

Miles Davis, Jaco Pastorious... I think I don't need to add more.

 

Dave, I think you have more or less our complete biographies by now... http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif

 

marino

[Steve44]

Thanks for leaving this one so open-ended, Dave. Here are 3 for me:

 

The only musician I'm going to mention here is a man named Stephen Nachmanovitch. Unfortunately, I have not yet heard any of his music. The way he influenced me is through his classic book, Free Play . Reading it was a journey for me, as I had mostly only heard improvisation and dabbled into it here and there. Just a few months after beginning his book, I began to improvise, and then my life changed. The book was my companion through my precarious early stage of improvising, when every sensation was brand new and amazing. I believe every musician should read this book.. it's about the essence of creativity, and it really gets it right.

 

My second big influence is the author Richard Bach, mostly for his book Illusions. I give a copy of this book to each of my true friends, as it is a basic yet artful outlining of the world as I see it. Sometimes it's frustrating though, because almost all the answers to life's questions are there in this little book. That's frustrating because sometimes you dont' want to accept something that's so simple, yet somehow it's all so perfect and so true.

 

My third influence is Wassily Kandinsky. It was through Kandinsky's Compositions that I fell in love with Art itself and decided I must pursue a career in the arts. While many might say they've heard that Kandinsky incorporated musical elements into his art, that's not why I dig it. In fact most of the music-like stuff that shows up in his writings on art I find to be off base. I don't even connect with it just because he has pieces that are "improvised". What I really get from Kandinsky is how he exquisitely encases emotions within the abstract. It almost makes the emotions more tangible than if he had painted a thought provoking scene. The fact that he could use pure color relationships and shape relationships to both synthesize and capture emotion really gives me inspiration to do the same with different timbres and chordal juxtapositions. I also tend to see a real temporal dimension in his art, which I do notice in other paintings as well, but for Kandinsky it's like you can see the journey of feelings within the image.

[steadyb]

Brian Wilson - Jimi Hendrix - Pete Townsend - Vic Mizzy

[Dave Bryce]

My second big influence is the author Richard Bach, mostly for his book Illusions.

 

I am also a big fan of Illusions.

 

I believe that I have given more copies of that book to friends of mine than any other, with the possible exception of Kurt Vonnegut's Breakfast of Champions.

 

dB

[DrMarkAndersenexcite.com]

Non-keyboard:

 

1) Miles Davis

2) John Coltrane

3) Ravi Shankar

4) Igor Stravinski

 

Non-musical:

 

Gene Wolfe (author of very literary science fiction)

Edward Abbey (author of Desert Solitaire, The Monkey Wrench Gang, etc.)

Ansel Adams (if only my compositions were that sinple, and that good)

Good scenery in general, especially mountains and deserts.

[Bucktunes]

For contemporary artists, no one impresses/inspires me more than Take6. If you haven't heard of them, it's probably because they mostly do Gospel/Contemporary Christian music. Because of this, they're probably modern music's best kept secret. Which is kind of a shame, because noone can touch the kind of stuff they can do.

 

For those who haven't heard of them, Take6 is a six man mostly accapella group (although they sometimes sing with instrumental accompaniment) that blends Gospel with modern jazz and R&B doo-wop. To give an idea of what they sound like, imagine 6 Bobby McFarrins ranging from Barry White bass to 3 tenors with a range up to the stratosphere. One of the guys is a keyboardist with a PhD in music, and all of them are instrumentalists as well.

But their most impressive work is their accapella stuff, ranging from wordless vocal arrangements of "All Blues" to jazzy Gospel tunes like "I've Got Life". They do vocal percussion, muted trumpet, trombone, and even lead guitar that sounds eerily authentic.

As a keyboardist, I'm constantly impressed by their arrangements and re-harmonizations of standards and pop/R&B tunes. Most of the vocals are arranged on keyboard, but a lot of it is improvised which is amazing, given

the complexity of the source material.

I could go on and on, but I don't want to bore those of you who are already familiar with them. If you ever get a chance to hear them live, don't miss it! http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Guest]

Who or what doesn't influence you when it comes down to it? Everything we see, hear, touch, smell or sense has some profound influence on us, be it good, bad or otherwise. That is the beauty of being an artist. We transpose from life to music and then the music, in turn breeds our influences in the hearts and minds of others. ....ok I'm tired...

Now as for inspiration, that is something else.

Rich Mullins has inspired me more than anyone I can think of. He was a most profound lyricist and musician as well as humanitarian. One of the few men I've ever met whose religion, I believe, was real. I miss him immensely.

Next to that, I would say my long time friends and fellow bandmates, Chris, Ike, Dave and my wife, Stacey and also my son, Jake. They continue to spur me on toward deeper musical inspiration. It's just plain great chemistry that never gets old. Even though our work and families sometimes get in the way for a while, the magic is always there. I have learned...no, discovered more about music since 1995 when I first began playing with these guys than I've learned since I first started playing when I was 6. They are not only great musicians, they are great people. I'm really lucky. mush mush http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Steve44]

Because of this, they're probably modern music's best kept secret. Which is kind of a shame, because noone can touch the kind of stuff they can do.

 

For Kurzweil owners, Take6 is they're best secret WEAPON!! The Kurzweil Take6 Sample CD is probably the best vocal sample CD ever made and is simply unbeatable in its usefulness for so many different styles of music. If you search around a PC2 hard enough, you can find those samples in there too.

 

Who or what doesn't influence you when it comes down to it?

 

It sounds like you've been reading Free Play as well.. or if not, then you're just someone who gets it. I dig.

[DOS]

I like a lot of classic rock. It seemed that for its time, the music was very genuine and artists were willing to try new and experimental things. I guess Led Zep would be my fav. I'm also inspired and Classical and Romantic music and all my music instructers who with their intimidating PhD's, have always had time to talk to me about music and help me.

 

Mike