Mike Stern | |
---|---|
![]() Stern in 2018 | |
Background information | |
Born | Boston, Massachusetts, U.S. | January 10, 1953
Genres | Jazz, jazz fusion, post-bop |
Occupation(s) | Guitarist |
Years active | 1976–present |
Labels | Atlantic, Heads Up |
Formerly of | Blood, Sweat & Tears |
Website | mikestern |
Mike Stern (born January 10, 1953) is an American jazz guitarist. After playing with Blood, Sweat & Tears, he worked with drummer Billy Cobham, then with trumpeter Miles Davis from 1981 to 1983 and again in 1985. He then began a solo career, releasing more than a dozen albums.
Stern was named Best Jazz Guitarist of 1993 by Guitar Player magazine. At the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal in June 2007, he was given the Miles Davis Award, which was created to recognize internationally acclaimed jazz artists whose work has contributed significantly to the renewal of the genre. In 2009 Stern was listed on Down Beat 's list of 75 best jazz guitarists of all time. He received Guitar Player magazine's Certified Legend Award on January 21, 2012.
Stern was born Michael Sedgwick in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Helen Stern (née Helen Phillips Burroughs), a sculptor and art patron, and Henry Dwight Sedgwick V. [1] His adoptive stepfather was Philip M. Stern, the son of businessman Edgar B. Stern Sr. [2] His half-sister is actress Kyra Sedgwick. Stern is married to guitarist and vocalist Leni Stern.
Stern grew up in Washington, D.C., and began playing guitar at age 12, emulating the likes of B.B. King, Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix. However, it wasn’t until he entered the Berklee College of Music in Boston that he took guitar seriously. [3] When he was twenty-two, he became a member of Blood, Sweat & Tears and spent three years with the band, [4] appearing on the albums More Than Ever and Brand New Day .
Simultaneously, he was lead guitarist of a D.C. glam-rock band, the Dubonettes, who later became Charlie and the Pep Boys. The quintet released one album, the Nils Lofgren-produced Daddy's Girl, in 1976 before Stern left the group [5] .
In 1979, he joined Billy Cobham's fusion band. Two years later he joined Miles Davis, making his public debut in 1981, a performance recorded on the album We Want Miles . He remained with Davis through 1983 until he was replaced by guitarist John Scofield. At the time, Stern was a heavy drinker and heroin user. In a 2009 interview, he said, "If Miles wants to put you in a rehab, you know you've got something wrong". [6] From 1983 to 1984 he toured with Jaco Pastorius (a period also characterized by heavy drug use) [7] and in 1985 returned to tour with Davis. Stern and his wife were in rehabilitation; they were also helped by Michael Brecker and others. [6]
Stern's solo debut, Upside Downside , with Jaco Pastorius, David Sanborn, and Bob Berg, was released on Atlantic Records in 1986. From 1986 through 1988, he was a member of Michael Brecker's quintet, appearing on Don't Try This at Home. His second Atlantic album, 1988's Time in Place , featured Peter Erskine on drums, Jim Beard on keyboards, Jeff Andrews on bass, Don Alias on percussion and Don Grolnick on organ. His next album, Jigsaw, was produced by guitarist Steve Khan and included the song "Chief", Stern's tribute to Miles Davis.
In 1989, Stern formed a touring group with Bob Berg, Dennis Chambers and Lincoln Goines. They remained together through 1992 and are featured on the album Odds or Evens. In 1992, Stern joined a reunited Brecker Brothers Band for two years. His acclaimed 1993 album, Standards (and Other Songs), led to his being named Best Jazz Guitarist of the Year by the readers and critics of Guitar Player . He followed that with 1994's Is What It Is and 1996's Between the Lines, both of which received Grammy Award nominations. In 1997 he released Give and Take, with bassist John Patitucci, drummer Jack DeJohnette, percussionist Don Alias and special guests Michael Brecker and David Sanborn. He won the Orville W. Gibson Award for Best Jazz Guitarist.
After fifteen years with Atlantic, Stern signed with ESC Records for the 2004 release of These Times, an eclectic album that included guest appearances by bassist Richard Bona, saxophonist Kenny Garrett and banjoist Béla Fleck. He joined the Heads Up label with the August 2006 release of Who Let the Cats Out? In 2008, he collaborated with the Yellowjackets for their Lifecycle album, contributing two compositions and performing on most of the tracks, and toured with the Yellowjackets for much of 2008 and 2009. In February 2009, in the first of a series of articles celebrating Down Beat 's 75th anniversary, Stern was named one of the 75 Great Guitarists of all time.
In August 2009, Stern released Big Neighborhood , which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Jazz Album. [8]
He was presented with Guitar Player magazine's Certified Legend Award on January 21, 2012. This was given to him at the Muriel Anderson All-Star Guitar night, where he performed with Lee Ritenour. [9]
In 2014, Stern toured with guitarist Eric Johnson in the Eclectic Guitar Tour. They recorded an album of the same name.
In the summer of 2016, Stern reported serious injuries to his shoulders and right arm after tripping and falling. It ended his European tour, and he had to modify his playing technique to keep performing. [10] In the summer of 2017 he returned to Europe on tour with a new formation called Mike Stern/Randy Brecker Band, featuring Randy Brecker (trumpet), Teymur Phell (bass guitar) and Lenny White (drums). [11] In 2019, Mike Stern collaborated with the Jeff Lorber Fusion to release Eleven .
An early and important guitar for Stern was a hybrid 1950s/1960s Fender Telecaster, previously owned by Roy Buchanan and Danny Gatton, which was stolen from him in an armed robbery in Boston. This guitar is the basis for a custom-made guitar built by Boston-based luthier Michael Aronson. [12]
The Aronson guitar is in turn the basis for the Yamaha PA1511MS, the Mike Stern signature model. [12] The neck position pickup is a Seymour Duncan '59 and it has a Tele Hot Rail in the bridge. [13]
Stern uses a pair of Fender Twin amps or his Yamaha G100-212. Stern's recognizable chorused sound is created in part by a Yamaha SPX-90, split for stereo. His pedal board consists mostly of Boss pedals. He uses two Boss DD-3 digital delays, one of which is set to a long delay time for "big, spacey sounds." [12] His distortion pedal is a Boss Distortion DS-1. [12]
With Miles Davis
With others
Blood, Sweat & Tears is an American jazz rock music group founded in New York City in 1967, noted for a combination of brass with rock instrumentation. BS&T has gone through numerous iterations with varying personnel and has encompassed a wide range of musical styles. Their sound has merged rock, pop and R&B/soul music with big band jazz.
John Francis "Jaco" Pastorius III was an American jazz bassist, composer, and producer. Widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential bassists of all time, Pastorius recorded albums as a solo artist, band leader, and as a member of the jazz fusion group Weather Report from 1976 to 1981. He also collaborated with numerous artists, including Pat Metheny and Joni Mitchell.
Kazumi Watanabe is a Japanese guitarist. Other guitarists such as Luke Takamura and Sugizo have cited him as an influence.
Weather Report was an American jazz fusion band active from 1970 to 1986. The band was founded in 1970 by Austrian keyboardist Joe Zawinul, American saxophonist Wayne Shorter, Czech bassist Miroslav Vitouš, American drummer Alphonse Mouzon as well as American percussionists Don Alias and Barbara Burton. The band was initially co-led by co-frontmen Zawinul and Shorter but, subsequently as the 1970s progressed, Zawinul largely became the sole musical leader of the group. Other prominent members at various points in the band's lifespan included Jaco Pastorius, Alphonso Johnson, Victor Bailey, Chester Thompson, Peter Erskine, Airto Moreira, and Alex Acuña. Throughout most of its existence, the band was a quintet consisting of Zawinul, Shorter, a bass guitarist, a drummer, and a percussionist.
John Scofield is an American guitarist and composer. His music over a long career has blended jazz, jazz fusion, funk, blues, soul and rock. He first came to mainstream attention as part of the band of Miles Davis; he has toured and recorded with many prominent jazz artists including saxophonists Eddie Harris, Dave Liebman, Joe Henderson, and Joe Lovano; keyboardists George Duke, Joey DeFrancesco, Herbie Hancock, Larry Goldings, and Robert Glasper; fellow guitarists Pat Metheny, John Abercrombie, Pat Martino, and Bill Frisell; bassists Marc Johnson and Jaco Pastorius; and drummers Billy Cobham and Dennis Chambers. Outside the world of jazz, he has collaborated with Phil Lesh, Mavis Staples, John Mayer, Medeski Martin & Wood, and Gov't Mule.
Patrick Bruce Metheny is an American jazz guitarist and composer.
John McLaughlin, also known as Mahavishnu, is an English guitarist, bandleader, and composer. A pioneer of jazz fusion, his music combines elements of jazz with rock, world music, Western classical music, flamenco, and blues. After contributing to several key British groups of the early 1960s, McLaughlin made Extrapolation, his first album as a bandleader, in 1969. He then moved to the U.S., where he played with drummer Tony Williams's group Lifetime and then with Miles Davis on his electric jazz fusion albums In a Silent Way, Bitches Brew, Jack Johnson, Live-Evil, and On the Corner. His 1970s electric band, the Mahavishnu Orchestra, performed a technically virtuosic and complex style of music that fused electric jazz and rock with Indian influences.
Yellowjackets is an American jazz fusion band founded in 1977 in Los Angeles, California.
Michael Leonard Brecker, nicknamed Dr. Sax, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. He was awarded 15 Grammy Awards as a performer and composer, received an honorary doctorate from Berklee College of Music in 2004, and was inducted into the DownBeat Jazz Hall of Fame in 2007.
Steve Smith and Vital Information is an American jazz fusion group led by drummer Steve Smith.
Randal Edward Brecker is an American trumpeter, flugelhornist, and composer. His versatility has made him a popular studio musician who has recorded with acts in jazz, rock, and R&B.
"Birdland" is a jazz/pop song written by Joe Zawinul of the band Weather Report as a tribute to the Birdland nightclub in New York City, which appeared on the band's 1977 album Heavy Weather. The Manhattan Transfer won a Grammy Award with their 1979 version of the song, which had lyrics by Jon Hendricks. Quincy Jones won two Grammy Awards for the version of the piece he included on his 1989 album Back on the Block. The leading Cuban band Los Van Van included an extended interpolation of the piece in their song Tim Pop/Birdland.
Richard Bona is a Cameroon-born American multi-instrumentalist and singer.
Dean Brown was an American jazz fusion guitarist and session musician.
Hiram Law Bullock was an American guitarist known mainly for playing in jazz funk and jazz fusion, but he also worked as a session musician in a variety of genres.
Heads Up International is a jazz record label that was formed in Cleveland, Ohio. It was bought by the Concord Music Group in 2005.
Timothy Gerard Landers is an American bassist best known for his contribution to the 1970s-80s jazz-fusion genre and his work with Al Di Meola, Billy Cobham, and Gil Evans. Landers is a session musician and was a member of Tom Scott's band on The Pat Sajak Show.
Randy Bernsen is an American jazz guitarist.
Bill Milkowski is an American jazz critic, journalist, and biographer. Since the 1970s he has written thousands of articles for magazines and album liner notes. He has written for DownBeat, JazzTimes, Jazziz, The Absolute Sound, Paste, Jazzthing and Guitar Club. He is the author of a biography of bassist Jaco Pastorius, a biography of Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, an annotated history of jive music, a collection of interviews., and a biography of saxophonist-composer Michael Brecker.
Seventh Avenue South was a jazz club in New York City. It existed from 1977 to 1987.