Joseph Byrd
| Joseph Byrd | |
|---|---|
| Birth name | Joseph Hunter Byrd |
| Also known as | Joe Byrd |
| Born |
December 19, 1937 Louisville, Kentucky, United States |
| Genres | Experimental music, minimal music, postmodern music, psychedelic rock, experimental rock, parlour music |
| Occupation(s) | Composer, arranger, producer, vocalist, educator |
| Instruments | Piano, organ, synthesizer, keyboard, calliope, harp, vocals |
| Years active | Late 1950s–present |
| Associated acts | The United States of America, Joe Byrd and the Field Hippies |
Joseph Hunter Byrd (born December 19, 1937) is an American composer, musician and academic. After first becoming known as an experimental composer in New York City and Los Angeles in the early and mid-1960s, he became the leader of The United States of America, an innovative but short-lived band that integrated electronic sound and radical political ideas into rock music. In 1968 he recorded the album The American Metaphysical Circus, credited to Joe Byrd and the Field Hippies. After working as a record producer, arranger, and soundtrack composer, he became a university teacher in music history and theory.
Byrd was born in Louisville, Kentucky, and was raised in Tucson, Arizona after his father purchased a mine near the Mexican border. As a teenager, Byrd played accordion and vibraphone in a series of pop and country bands, started writing his own arrangements, and performed on some local TV shows. He formed his first jazz quartet while a student at the University of Arizona, where he studied composition with Barney Childs (B.M., 1959). He began his graduate studies in composition on a Sollnit Fellowship at Stanford University, where he first met La Monte Young, then a graduate student at the nearby University of California, Berkeley, as well as Terry Riley and Steve Reich.
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