"The instruction of the wise is to learn the... compositions of both the saints and the music of the folk." - Anonymous 16th c. Hindustani song text.
Home Musicians and Groups Recording Services CD's and MP3s Ruby Gamba
The following is a short
biography and artistic mission statement of sorts. It’s
probably more than you want to know. For
the expurgated version of my bio, click here.
But since you asked....
I
was born in Los Gatos, California, and I am told that I began playing music as
soon as I was able to crawl up on the bench of my parents’ 1960’s Wurlitzer
home organ. I began formal lessons in organ and piano when I was six, and
began studying violin at the age of eight.
This study led to the cello, on which I played and performed from the age
of ten until I had finished high school at Oregon City High in Oregon.
My parents supported my musical habit throughout my youth by giving me
lessons, season tickets to the San Jose Symphony when I was in elementary
school, and supplying me with a good stereo and a constant supply of records. At
an early age I had developed a preference for Bach, Vivaldi, and other composers
of the Baroque, and a real fondness for Mozart. It was through my stereo and 1970’s FM radio, however, that I developed an overwhelming passion for Rock
n’ Roll. I became obsessed about the music of
The Who, Led Zeppelin, The Grateful Dead, The Doors, The
Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, and Frank Zappa, as well as the sounds of many of the New
Wave and Synth Pop artists of the early and mid 80’s, especially The Police,
Depeche Mode, and Yazoo.
After
high school I sold my cello and bought an electric bass guitar and a really big
amp (too big, actually). I
discovered that I was a quick study on the bass, and at the age of
nineteen I
joined my first band, a psychedelic revival act called the Bo Diddly Headhunters.
Along
with teaching bass out of a local guitar store, I also began sitting in with
other Portland artists, such as the Do Jump Movement
Theater, Lou Jones,
Zuzu’s Petals, Theater of Sheep, and many others.
In 1987 I started a Bachelors degree program in jazz studies on the double bass at Marylhurst University near Portland, Oregon. During these years I listened intently to the world–music experiments of Paul Simon and the African rhythms of Obo Addy and Kukrudu. I studied Indian music with sitarist Rik Masterson, tuning my bass like a deep sitar to play ragas. I also studied tabla, taking master classes when possible with the world renowned Zakir Hussain. I also studied composition at Marylhurst. My professor, Sister Magdeline Fautch, was and is an amazing teacher. I only hope that my works even slightly pay tribute to the insight and artistry she attempted to instill in me.
I continued to study bass with Glen Moore (of the group
“Oregon”), who is a true musical giant.
He turned me on to many new sounds and encouraged me to take whatever
music I’m playing and make it my own.
I remember that one of my first assignments was to analyze the chord
structures of Anton Webern’s Three Little Pieces for Cello and Piano Op. 11,
and improvise on them. My second
bass teacher, Rob Thomas (also, and primarily, an electric violinist), taught me
many of the fundamentals of jazz, and turned me on to Miles Davis, Charlie
Parker, Bill Evans, John Coltrane, et al.
A year-long bout with tendonitis put the brakes on all
this activity, however. It really
was devastating, but even adversity has its lessons. I started playing recorder to keep myself from going crazy
from inactivity, and through it discovered a whole new repertoire: the realm of
Early Music and Historical Performance Practice. I tore into this as avidly
as I had torn into Rock n’ Roll as a teenager.
Within a couple of years I had acquired a bass viola da gamba and began
to study upon it. With the help of my
first viol teacher, Tim Scott, a new direction to my career began to take shape.
Within the next couple of years, starting in 1992, I performed
extensively around the Portland area, including a year–long engagement with
the Oregon Renaissance Band, a performance of Bach’s Cantata 106 with the
Oregon Bach Festival Orchestra under the direction of Helmuth Rilling, and
various other performances. I
became president of the Early Music Guild of Oregon, and I was hired on as music
director for the Tygre’s Heart Shakespeare Company. In 1994, after taking a
year off after my Bachelors degree was finished, I went to Tallahassee, FL, to
attend Florida State University and teach viola da gamba for three years.
I earned a Masters of Music in Historical Musicology from FSU, and
performed both on campus and off with the Tallahassee Bach Parley.
While there, I frequently drove up to Atlanta, Georgia to study viola da
gamba with Martha Bishop.
It was at Florida State where I first met and performed
with Mike Pietranczyk, the first keyboardist for the group discontinuo.
He was a Masters organ student there at the time. It was also in Tallahassee that I heard the Blues played live and loud in
a deep South juke joint. It was
also in Tallahassee where I heard Gospel music sung in an African-American church.
It was in Tallahassee where I first heard old–time music, banjo and
mandolin, the high lonesome sound, played right in front of my ears.
It was where I first tasted real barbecue, and first drank sweet tea.
In the South, the music and the culture come right up out of the ground,
like cypress knees in the swamps, sometimes beautiful, sometime dangerous and
creepy. In Florida, I
re–discovered the guitar, and the roots of my old Rock n' Roll passion.
In the Deep South I really experienced for the first time the American
musical Soul.
I left Tallahassee to complete my education in the Early
Music Institute at the Indiana University School of Music. I hold a Doctor of
Musical Arts degree in Operation of Early Music Programs. I have had the distinct honor
to have studied intensively with Wendy Gillespie, Nigel North, Stanley Ritchie,
Elisabeth Wright, Paul Hillier, Massimo Ossi, and many others. I have also had the good
fortune to have met and worked with some astounding players in Japan, including
Yukimi Kambe, Toshinari Ohashi, and others.
At IU Mike and I met violinist Marty Davids, and
discontinuo came into being. For me, discontinuo is the audible culmination of
everything I have ever heard and been influenced by.
In it, I can use my extensive classical training in conjunction with my
multicultural imagination to create new sounds, new pieces from old pieces, and
to explore the possibilities of a new instrument, the Ruby
Gamba. Mike has since
left our group, but David Yearsley, a professor of Organ at Cornell University
(and an amazing player) has more than filled his shoes.
We consider ourselves so fortunate to have him aboard.
When David is out of the country, which sometime occurs, jazz pianist,
fortepianist, harpsichordist and
synthesist Blaise Bryski joins us to put his unique stamp on our repertoire.
I am now located in Aurora, NY, in the Finger Lakes
region Upstate. I live in the
middle of a geographical triangle that includes Syracuse, Rochester, and Ithaca.
I hold the position of Assistant Professor of Music at Wells College in
Aurora, and I offer classes in Western Music History, Global Music, the History of Rock
n’ Roll, and Historical Performance Practice.
I teach private lessons in viola da gamba, guitar, violin, viola, cello,
bass (electric included), banjo, mandolin… and so on.
I also offer instruction in studio recording, composing, arranging, and
producing.
While discontinuo is my main artistic project, I continue
to explore the possibilities of the viola da gamba as a truly modern instrument
in many different genres. I can be
found performing in clubs, concert halls, and recording in studios in all genres
of music. It could well be that the
viola da gamba is capable of being a defining instrumental voice in the 21st
century. Who knows?
Let’s find out!
V.
"If it sounds good, it is good." - Duke Ellington
Home Musicians and Groups Recording Services CD's and MP3s Ruby Gamba