Artist description The Instrument -- In 1978 my friends Paul, Louis, Pat, and David took the LIRR and then the subway to Union Square Station, walked across 14th street and into the Palladium. After a short set by Deodato, Stanley Clarke took the stage Somewhere in the set, Stanley brings out the piccolo bass and proceeds to execute dueling leads with Ray Gomez. As cool as this stuff was, this was not what initially drove me to experiment and then adopt piccolo fretless bass as my main instrument. In 1992, I began writing a set of instrumental music written for two basses, vibes, drums, and sax. In all, between we wrote and recorded about 10 compositions. At first I was playing my Fender Precision Fretless with standard strings. After realizing that I was playing most of the parts beyond the 12th fret, I began experimenting with D’Addario Piccolo Bass strings. The result changed the trajectory of my musical journey. Playing a Fender Fretless Precision Bass, I developed over time three basic tones. The first is a “clean” sound that in my mind works like a dobro. A semi-clean “snapped” sound takes the part of a finger-picked Telecaster. Last is the “animal” – overdriven with huge sustain and feedback, it is the whammy bar sound without the whammy bar.

Music Style New Jazz

Musical Influences Frisell, Hot Tuna, Dead, Monk, Mingus

Similar Artists Frisell, Modeski, Martin, and Wood

Artist History This Music -- I have set out to write and play the kind of stuff I would pay to see live by anybody. In almost every song there are motifs and ideas that are drawn from elements that have been influencing since I was little. Half of the songs on this CD were developed during mid-1990s the others were written during the last year. Blue Minsk, The Way Back, The Pier, and Jeff’s Basement were recorded and mixed at Studio 420 in Tarpon Springs Florida between November and December 2002. Laura’s There, In the Storm (they cling together), Circle in the Square, and The Way Back? were recorded live at the Unitarian Universalists of Clearwater’s Octagon Arts Center in August of 2002

Group Members Billy Sokol – Fretless Piccolo Bass on all tracks Glenn Trojnar – Drums on tracks 1,4,7, and 8. Assorted percussion on tracks 7 and 8. Harmonica on tracks 2,3,4,5, and 6. Watts Shimura – 5 String Electric Bass on tracks 1,4,7, and 8 All songs were written by William Sokol.

Instruments Fretless Piccolo Bass, 5-String Bass, Drums, Harmonica

Albums The Way Back

Press Reviews http://www.squidsear.com/cgi-bin/news/newsView.cgi?newsID=62

Location Palm Harbor, FL - USA

Copyright notice. All material on MP3.com is protected by copyright law and by international treaties. You may download this material and make reasonable number of copies of this material only for your own personal use. You may not otherwise reproduce, distribute, publicly perform, publicly display, or create derivative works of this material, unless authorized by the appropriate copyright owner(s).