Michael Hedges

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Michael Hedges

Background information
Born December 31, 1953(1953-12-31)
Sacramento, California, USA
Died December 2, 1997 (aged 43)
Mendocino County, California
Genre(s) World, Fingerstyle, New Age
Occupation(s) Musician, composer
Instrument(s) Guitar, flute
Years active 1974–1997
Label(s) Windham Hill
Associated acts Michael Manring
Website Nomad Land
Notable instrument(s)
Martin D-28
1920s Dyer harp guitar

Michael Hedges (December 31, 1953 – December 2, 1997) was an American acoustic guitarist born in Sacramento, California, and raised in Enid, Oklahoma.

Contents

[edit] Background

Hedges attended Phillips University in Enid, studying classical guitar. It was here that he studied under his compositional mentor, E. J. Ulrich. Subsequently Hedges was a Peabody Conservatory composition major who applied his classically trained musical background in combination with various unusual techniques to the steel-string acoustic guitar. He covered a wide range of musical styles and was considered an extremely dynamic performer in concert. He was discovered in the early eighties by William Ackerman who heard him performing in a Palo Alto cafe and immediately signed him to a recording contract on the Windham Hill label.[1]

[edit] Recordings

The first two records Michael Hedges made — Breakfast in the Field and Aerial Boundaries — were milestones for the acoustic guitar. He then branched out into singing and performing more popular forms of music, although he would periodically make a return to more guitar-centred music. He wrote nearly exclusively in alternate tunings. Some of the techniques he used include slap harmonics (created by slapping the strings over a harmonic node), use of right hand hammer-ons (particularly on bass notes), use of the left hand for melodic or rhythmic hammer-ons and pull offs, percussive slapping on the guitar body, as well as unusual strummings. He also made extensive use of string dampening as employed in classical guitar, and was known to insist strongly on the precise duration of sounds and silences in his pieces. He also played guitar-variants like the harp guitar (an instrument with additional bass strings), and the Trans-Trem Guitar. He was a multi-instrumentalist, playing piano, percussion, tin whistle, harmonica, and flute, among others on his albums. Bassist Michael Manring contributed to nearly all of Michael's records.

Encouraged by Ackerman, Hedges began to incorporate vocals into his repertiore after Aerial Boundaries. This resulted in his third album Watching My Life Go By. In hopes that playing the new songs live would improve Hedges as a vocalist, Ackerman asked Hilleary Burgess to accompany Hedges for the following tour and make live recordings of the shows. These recordings resulted in the Live on the Double Planet album. Although no commercial recordings have yet been released, Hedges toured briefly with Leo Kottke. These shows included solo performances by Kottke and Hedges and a number of duets including performances of Kottke's "Doodles" with Michael playing a soprano guitar.

Hedges had a very broad range of influences and his output spans many genres. His musical education was largely in modern 20th century composition. He listened to Leo Kottke, Martin Carthy, John Martyn, and the Beatles, but his approach to composition owed much to Stravinsky, Varèse, Webern, and Reich, in addition to experimental composers such as Morton Feldman. He saw himself as a composer who played guitar, rather than a guitarist who composed music. He was often categorized as New Age due to his association with the Windham Hill record label. Somewhat in reaction to this, he would describe his music as "Heavy Mental", "New Edge", ""Acoustic Thrash", "Deep Tissue Gladiator Guitar" or "Savage Myth Guitar," amongst other terms.[2] Michael was affectionately known as "The Guitarist from Another Planet".[citation needed] Michael Hedges never realized his ultimate musical vision, which was to form a band of like-minded musicians and to record and tour with them.[citation needed]

[edit] Guitars

Hedges regularly used the following instruments[3]

  • 1971 Martin D-28 (nicknamed "Barbara") with a combination of a Sunrise S-1 magnetic pickup and FRAP contact pickup under the treble strings
  • custom 1980s Takamine with his name on the headstock
  • Lowden L-250
  • Martin J-65M
  • 1920s Dyer harp guitar configured with a FRAP/autoharp pickup combo / reconfigured with Sunrise S-1 and two Barcus Berry magnetic pickups for the sub-basses (glued straight to the body)
  • Steve Klein electric harp guitar with a Trans-Trem bridge
  • black Dyer with a FRAP/autoharp pickup combo—and rattlesnake tail wedged under the sub-basses at headstock

Other guitars:

  • Hedges recorded Eleven Small Roaches, Baby Toes and Two Days Old, on the 1981 album Breakfast in the Field, on a six-string guitar built in 1978 by Ken DuBourg of Arbutus, Maryland.[4]

[edit] Death

In late 1997, Hedges died at the age of 43 in a car accident along State Route 128 in Mendocino County, near Boonville (about 100 miles (160 km) northwest of San Francisco). According to his manager and longtime friend Hilleary Burgess, he was driving home from San Francisco International Airport after a Thanksgiving visit to his girlfriend in Long Island, New York. His car apparently skidded off a rain-slicked S-curve and down a 120-foot (37 m) cliff. Hedges was thrown from his car and appeared to have died nearly instantly. It was a few days before his body was found[5]. His record Oracle posthumously won the 1998 Grammy Award for Best New Age Album.

His unfinished last recordings were brought to completion in the album Torched, with the help of his former manager Hilleary Burgess and friends David Crosby and Graham Nash.[6]

[edit] Quotations about Michael Hedges

"I feel I can always hear his heart when he plays. He respected my playing too, and that simply thrills me." - Pete Townshend [7]

"Michael was unique. His music transcends genre and trend. It's truly musical, fun and enlightening.” - Steve Vai [7]

"His playing has a feel and timbre all its own - technically brilliant, but always organic and true." - Joe Satriani [7]

"One of the most brilliant musicians in America." - David Crosby [7]

"I considered him to be a genius and when he died I lost a great friend." Graham Nash [7]

"There was simply no one like him." - Bonnie Raitt [7]

[edit] Discography

[edit] Trivia

One of Hedges' songs, 'Ritual Dance' performed by Kaki King, is featured in the movie August Rush.[8]

[edit] External links

[edit] Video Recordings of Guitar Performances

[edit] References

  1. ^ Acoustic Guitar Cover Story
  2. ^ Michael Hedges Bio
  3. ^ Michael Hedges' Stage Rig
  4. ^ Album notes; Acoustic Guitar Magazine: July 2005, No. 151
  5. ^ Local news report
  6. ^ Michael Hedges: Torched
  7. ^ a b c d e f Testimonials
  8. ^ August Rush: Music From The Motion Picture, Sony BMG