Artists

Chautauqua is the 5th studio recording from Greg Foresman. The music in this collection continues Greg’s penchant for drawing on different musical styles to deliver one unique sound. Rock, Blues, Folk and maybe for the first time a little bit of a Country influence is heard. Commenting on his latest project, Greg said, all in all though, I think this is my most focused sounding record.

Greg was born in 1960 in Louisville, Kentucky, and by his early teens was consumed with playing the guitar and finding like-minded people to jam and form groups with. Playing at back yard parties and school dances by the time he was 14 and moving into nightclubs at 16, Greg started his life on the road at 18 years old fresh out of Central High School.

For the next 10 years, Greg’s musical career was relegated to playing mostly cover music in clubs throughout the Southwestern and Midwestern states; although with the help of his trusty Porta-Studio, he was always writing songs and working on ways of getting the songs down on tape properly. This period was highlighted by The Hammerheads, a hard-rocking, Southern funk group that tore up the I-65 circuit from 1988 to 1992. The Hammerheads released a self-titled Live CD in 1992.

After the break-up of The Hammerheads, Greg soon became an in-demand touring guitarist in Nashville, Tennessee (where he moved in 1988). He also began The Greg Foresman Band in 1993. This grand experiment as it’s now considered, pushed Greg to the center stage spotlight, a place on the stage where to say he wasn’t extremely comfortable would be an understatement.

Greg Wurth is a Grammy Nominated, Gold & Platinum award winning producer. He’s been Steve Vai‘s engineer for over a decade with other credits ranging from Zakk Wylde, Yngwie Malmsteen, Mary J. Blige, Nuno Bettencourt, Tosin Abasi, LA Guns, & Reignwolf.

As of 2015 Greg has launched two new ventures: “Inside The Studio With Greg Wurth”, a video channel created along with Lisamarie Costabile that offers fun and insightful learning videos as well as interviews with professionals in the industry. The other is “Greg Wurth Audio” which is a pro audio hardware company with the first offering being an all discrete 16 ch. summing mixer called “The Oracle”.

“I grew up in southern San Diego. My parents were big fans of music and introduced me to The Beatles and Led Zeppelin early on. I used to collect cassettes & CD’s in the early 90’s and eventually I became interested enough to play an instrument, so I bought a guitar. I took lessons for a few years and had some bands but I realized that it wasn’t a natural thing for me. I eventually figured out that I was meant to Produce and Engineer music.”

HeXx Henderson’s musical influences include rock guitar heros like Jimi Hendrix, Ritchie Blackmore, Roy Buchanan, Jeff Beck, The Ventures, and Lonny Mack. Great Lap Steel Guitar players like Leon McAuliffe, Santo and Johnny, Buddy Emmons, Alvino Rey, and Little Roy Wiggins, pioneering lap steel Blues players Hop Wilson and Freddy Roulette, and jazz organ great Jimmy Smith also had a big impact on HeXx.

Through his study of Rock, Blues, and Country’s greatest masters, and by playing with diverse musicians of the highest caliber, HeXx doggedly earned the profound knowledge of music which enables him to weave many influences and styles together to form a very distinctive new sound – Rock, Jazz, Blues, Country, and Hawaiian music, with threads of Gospel, Pop, Surf, Heavy Metal, and Funk, all color the final, masterful design.

Jack Gardiner is a 26-year-old professional guitarist/teacher/musician born and raised in Liverpool, England. Coming from the city most famous for The Beatles, music has been a part of Jack’s life from very early on. His father (Roger Gardiner) has played the bass guitar for over 40 years. When Jack was a child, his father was watching a Dweezil Zappa VHS one night, with special guest Steve Vai on guitar. It was at that point, Jack said to his father ‘I want to be a guitarist like him!’.

At the age of 9, Jack started to take Classical Guitar lessons in school and at the age of 11, he took an interest in the Electric Guitar, studying for a year with Guitar Virtuoso John Wheatcroft (Guitar X, Guitar Techniques magazine). He performed his first few performances and gigs around the same time. It wasn’t until Jack reached the age of 15 that he started to take the guitar seriously. After finding a number of highly talented musicians through YouTube, Jack found huge inspiration in the playing of guitarists such as Tom Quayle, Rick Graham, Guthrie Govan, Martin Miller and Marco Sfogli. Jack began taking lessons from Tom Quayle soon after, which shaped his style and sound significantly.

In the years that followed, Jack has continued to grow and develop. Playing with various acts and artists, from Rap Music, to 60’s Funk, to straight ahead Guitar Fusion. He has recently toured with the likes of Stu Hamm (Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Allan Holdsworth, Frank Gambale) and Craig Blundell (Steven Wilson, Frost) as well as the 80’s Brit-Pop Band China Crisis. His goal is to develop, grow and perform as a modern young musician with a modern approach in todays ever-changing music world.

‘Instantly, when I started to work with these guys, I felt ‘Wow. They get it.‚’ They had the sound I’d been hearing in my head.’ So after two CDs, a big ACM award and a string of radio successes, Jake Owen has come into his own. He observes, ‘When you get a record deal, no one hands you a manual or an instruction booklet and tells you how you’re supposed to conduct your professional life. I was a kid straight out of college, thrown out on these massive stages. I really didn’t know anything. I had to find out who I am.’

His roots are fairly easy to describe. Jake Owen was raised in the coastal town of Vero Beach, FL. He and his fraternal twin Jarrod grew up in the sand and surf. Both boys attended Florida State. That’s where music became Jake Owen’s true focus. He suffered a severe shoulder injury while wake boarding. This ended his days on the university’s golf team. During his recuperation, his left arm was in a sling. Jake realized that even with his arm in a sling, he could hold a guitar so he started playing guitar and writing songs.

London-based session guitarist, Jake Willson, is quickly garnering a reputation as one of the most exciting and versatile new voices in the guitar world.

Jake was awarded a scholarship to study guitar at the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston, USA, and upon returning to the UK, completed his degree and began performing around the country with a wide range of ensembles playing everything from modern fusion and hard-edged blues to commercial rock and pop. Among recent gig highlights are the British Summertime Festival at Hyde Park and the 2013 British Grand Prix, Silverstone.

As well as playing guitar, Jake maintains a parallel career as a composer, and his works are regularly performed by world-class musicians. He is currently studying for a PhD in Classical Composition at the University of Surrey, where he is an associate lecturer in the fields of orchestration, jazz studies, performance and composition.

On August 21, 1939, James Burton was born in Dubberly, Louisiana, but he grew up in Shreveport. Before he ever picked up a guitar, he would be beating on broom sticks and beat on pretty much everything else around the house. His parents got him his first guitar, which was an acoustic one. His second guitar was also an acoustic one, but it was in a J&S Music store in Shreveport where he first saw the ‘53 Fender Telecaster and knew that this was the guitar for him.

James has earned the right to be called ‘legend’ over the years that have followed, and is considered to be a true master of his art.

Jason T. Miller had little chance of making a career for himself in anything other than music, and this was clear from a very young age. In fact, it probably began at around eight-years-old, when he picked up the guitar for the first time.

Years after veteran TV/film composer and arranger, Bruce Miller, bought the instrument for his son, Jason, they’d find themselves frequent collaborators (as co-composers of many primetime network TV shows). Today, Bruce can add the role of proud father to his list of credits, as Jason has established himself as a dynamic, versatile, independent behind-the-scenes force in the music industry.

When Jimmy was 12 years old, his father took him to see a musician named Gene Johnson, who played the mandolin, in a small club near Detroit, MI. Gene became one of Jimmy’s bluegrass hero’s and later on his partner in the group Diamond Rio. Jimmy was born in Minneapolis, MN on August 26 and when he was a teenager he had already mastered the banjo and gave lessons, however, by the time he was in college in Nashville, he found out that guitar players were more in demand than banjo pickers, so he mastered the guitar.

Jimmy joined the Tennessee River Boys in 1984 at Opryland theme park alongside Marty and Dan. His musical influences are Earl Scruggs, Leon Rhodes and Clarence White and one of his all-time favorite singers is Ella Fitzgerald.

Jimmy is married and he and his wife adopted two boys and are enjoying family life. Jimmy also enjoys sky diving and weight training.

Joe Arick began his musical voyage at age 6 playing piano for his family’s traveling gospel quartet. His love of music and the piano, led him to teach himself multiple instruments.

In 2004, Joe moved to Nashville and in 2005 he landed his first nationally touring gig as bassist/bandleader for Big Machine recording artist Danielle Peck. Since then he has worked with several artists including Chuck Wicks, Julianne Hough, Josh Turner, Sarah Buxton, Hunter Hayes, Florida Georgia Line, and others.