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Bill Miller (born January 23, 1955) is a Native American singer/songwriter and artist of Mohican heritage. He is a guitarist, player of the Native American flute and painter.
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Bill Miller (born January 23, 1955) is a Native American singer/songwriter and artist of Mohican heritage. He is a guitarist, player of the Native American flute and painter.
Bill Miller was born on the Stockbridge-Munsee reservation, near Shawano in northern Wisconsin. His Mohican name is Fush-Ya Heay Aka (meaning "bird song"). He began playing guitar when he was 12 years old. In 1973, he moved to Milwaukee and won an art school scholarship to Layton School of Art, later attending University of Wisconsin at LaCrosse. [1]
In 1984, he moved to Nashville. His biggest break came when popular musician Tori Amos, after listening to his Red Road CD on her tour bus, asked him to serve as the opening act on her Under the Pink tour. Miller continuously gained fans with other artists from a broad musical spectrum. He went on to tour with diverse musicians such as Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, The BoDeans, Richie Havens, John Carter Cash, and Arlo Guthrie and wrote songs with artists such as Nanci Griffith, Peter Rowan and Kim Carnes. [2]
In 1995, Miller's flute playing was featured on the Vanessa Williams song “Colors of the Wind”, the theme song on soundtrack of Disney’s Pocahontas , which won a Grammy Award and both the Academy Award and Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song. [2]
Miller has collaborated with other Native American musicians such as Robert Mirabal, Carlos Nakai, and Joanne Shenandoah. His project with Mirabal, Native Suite was an experimental and traditional project, featuring flute and percussion, as well as Mohican pow-wow singing. His vocals appeared on Thomas Kinkade's 2000 album Music of Light which featured Rob Mathes and Australian Michelle Tumes; he also was featured on Cherokee singer-songwriter Jason Upton's album Great River Road.
In early 2008, Miller worked on a project in La Crosse, Wisconsin for The Pump House, a regional arts center. Miller painted one of many 6-foot-tall (1.8 m) herons that were auctioned off and placed around the city in honor of fine arts. In April 2008, his symphony, "The Last Stand" was performed as world premiere by the La Crosse Symphony Orchestra with Amy Mills conducting, along with Native American musicians and dancers. The symphony was inspired from Miller's visit of the Battle of the Little Bighorn site, when he was nine years old. Called a "symphony of hope", it deals with that battle and the reconciliation which Miller, feels must still occur and composed with Joshua Yudkin and Kristin Wilkinson. [3] [4] Thirty-three photos taken by David Joseph Marcou of "The Last Stand" world debut's dress-rehearsal are in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian.
In an interview, Miller said, "I appreciate people who have something to stand up for. I stand up for the truth. If you stand up for what you believe in you have no idea how many people you'll affect."
Miller's songs have been deeply spiritual and have explored his Christian faith in his indigenous language; his albums Spirit Rain and his 2000 record, Hear Our Prayer, released by Integrity Music as a Christian worship music project exemplify this dialog. While some songs were co-written by songwriters in the genre, he re-recorded familiar songs such as "Praises" from The Red Road and "Listen to Me" from Raven in the Snow which, in a new context made clear that he could be fully Native and Christian. Notable cuts on the album were his cover of Bob Dylan's "I Believe in You" and a reinterpretation of the spiritual "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me 'Round."
Miller has won three Grammy Awards, numerous Native American Music Awards, including a Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2005, Miller's instrumental Cedar Dream Songs won a Grammy Award for Best Native American Music Album.
William Richard Frisell is an American jazz guitarist. He first came to prominence at ECM Records in the 1980s, as both a session player and a leader. He went on to work in a variety of contexts, notably as a participant in the Downtown Scene in New York City, where he formed a long working relationship with composer and saxophonist John Zorn. He was also a longtime member of veteran drummer Paul Motian's groups from the early 1980s until Motian's death in 2011. Since the late 1990s, Frisell's output as a bandleader has also integrated prominent elements of folk, country, rock ‘n’ roll and Americana. He has six Grammy nominations and one win.
Vanguard Recording Society is an American record label set up in 1950 by brothers Maynard and Seymour Solomon in New York City. It was a primarily classical label at its peak in the 1950s and 1960s, but also has a catalogue of recordings by a number of pivotal jazz, folk, and blues musicians. The Bach Guild was a subsidiary label.
"Colors of the Wind" is a song written by composer Alan Menken and lyricist Stephen Schwartz for Walt Disney Pictures' 33rd animated feature film, Pocahontas (1995). The film's theme song, "Colors of the Wind" was originally recorded by American singer and actress Judy Kuhn in her role as the singing voice of Pocahontas. A pop ballad, the song's lyrics are about animism and respecting nature, finding its roots in indigenous Native American culture, perspectives which have later been adopted in both transcendentalist literature and New Age spirituality.
Paul Brownlee McCandless Jr. is an American multi-instrumentalist and founding member of the American jazz group Oregon. He is one of the few jazz oboists. He also plays bass clarinet, English horn, flute and soprano saxophone.
Raymond Carlos Nakai is a Native American flutist of Navajo and Ute heritage. Nakai played brass instruments in high school and college, and auditioned for the Armed Forces School of Music after a two-year period in the United States Navy. He began playing a traditional Native American cedar flute after an accident left him unable to play the trumpet. Largely self-taught, he released his first album Changes in 1983, and afterward signed a contract with Canyon Records, who produced more than thirty of his albums in subsequent years. His music prominently features original compositions for the flute inspired by traditional Native American melodies. Nakai has collaborated with musicians William Eaton, Peter Kater, Philip Glass, Nawang Khechog, Paul Horn, and Keola Beamer. He has received 11 Grammy Award nominations for his albums.
Mary Youngblood (Aleut/Seminole) is an American musician and performer of the Native American flute.
Robert Mirabal is a Pueblo musician and Native American flute player and maker from Taos Pueblo, New Mexico.
The Gathering of Nations is the largest pow-wow in the United States and North America. It is held annually on the fourth weekend in April, on the Powwow Grounds at Expo NM, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Over 565 tribes from around the United States and 220 from Canada travel to Albuquerque to participate.
Peter Kater is a German-born American pianist, composer and Grammy Award winner.
José Serebrier is a Uruguayan conductor and composer. He is one of the most recorded conductors of his generation.
The Bob Cole Conservatory of Music is the school of music at California State University, Long Beach. In March 2008, the music department was renamed the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music in honor of an endowment gift of $16.4 million from the estate of Robert "Bob" Cole. Cole, a Long Beach real estate investor, long-time music lover, and amateur pianist, died in 2004. Following its disbursement, the gift will benefit the students of the conservatory in the form of scholarships and other awards.
Ron Korb is a Grammy-nominated Canadian flutist (flautist) and composer.
Sacred Ground: A Tribute to Mother Earth is a compilation album of Native American music released through Silver Wave Records on September 13, 2005. In 2006, the album won Jim Wilson the Grammy Award for Best Native American Music Album.
Cedar Dream Songs is an album by Bill Miller, released through Paras Recordings on April 20, 2004. In 2005, the album won Miller the Grammy Award for Best Native American Music Album.
Michael Dalmau Colina is a Grammy-winning American musician, composer, producer and engineer. He has written music for television, film, theatre, dance and live performances on concert stages throughout the United States, Europe and Japan. Colina is best known as producer and writer on recordings for musicians Bob James, David Sanborn, Michael Brecker, Marcus Miller, Bill Evans and Michael Franks. He has won three gold albums, has received four Grammy Award nominations, and won three Grammy Awards for Best Contemporary Jazz Album.
Willard Somers Elliot was an American bassoonist and composer. He was the bassoonist with the Houston Symphony Orchestra (1946–1949), bassoonist with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (1951–1956), principal bassoonist with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (1956–1964), and principal bassoonist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (1964–1997). Elliot composed and twice performed the Concerto for Bassoon and Orchestra with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under conductors Seiji Ozawa and Jean Martinon.
Billy Peterson is an American bass player, songwriter, composer, session musician and producer. Growing up in a family of professional musicians, Peterson started with music at a very young age. Billy is the brother of Paul Peterson and Ricky Peterson.
The Red Road is a 1993 country music album by Native American singer Bill Miller. The album was his major-label debut, with Warner Western, and brought him to a broader popular country music public. The album has been classed among classic country "drivers'" albums.
Spirit of the American Range is a classical music album by the Oregon Symphony under the artistic direction of Carlos Kalmar, released by the Dutch record label Pentatone on February 10, 2015. The album was recorded at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall in Portland, Oregon in April 2013 and January 2014. It contains works by three American 20th-century composers: Walter Piston's ballet suite from The Incredible Flutist, George Antheil's "A Jazz Symphony", and Aaron Copland's Symphony No. 3. The recording was the third by the orchestra under Kalmar's leadership, following the highly successful Music for a Time of War (2011) and This England (2012). Spirit of the American Range received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Orchestral Performance, and its producer, Blanton Alspaugh, was nominated for Producer of the Year, Classical.
Land is an album by the Native American musician Robert Mirabal, released in 1995. The album originated as a score for a dance piece by Eiko & Koma, which was first performed in 1991. It was nominated for a First Americans in the Arts award. Mirabal and Eiko & Koma adapted part of the score for later productions.
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