Michael Hedges
| Michael Hedges | |
|---|---|
Michael Hedges
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Michael Alden Hedges |
| Born |
December 31, 1953 Sacramento, California, U.S. |
| Died | December 2, 1997 (aged 43) Mendocino County, California |
| Genres | New Acoustic, world, new-age |
| Occupation(s) | Musician, composer, Singer-songwriter |
| Instruments | Guitar, harp guitar, flute, harmonica, tin whistle, percussion, piano |
| Years active | 1974–1997 |
| Labels | Windham Hill |
| Associated acts | Michael Manring |
| Website | Nomad Land |
| Notable instruments | |
|
Martin D-28 Ken DuBourg custom steel string guitar W. J. Dyer & Bros. Style 4 Symphony Harp Guitar |
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Michael Alden Hedges (December 31, 1953 – December 2, 1997) was an American composer, acoustic guitarist and singer-songwriter.
Michael Hedges was born in Sacramento, the son of Dr. Thayne Alden Hedges and Ruth Evelyn Hedges Ipsen. Hedges' life in music began in Enid, Oklahoma, as he flirted with various instruments before focusing on flute and guitar. He eventually enrolled at Phillips University in Enid to study classical guitar and composition under E. J. Ulrich. Subsequently Hedges studied as a composition major at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Maryland, where he applied his classically trained musical background in combination with various unusual techniques to the steel-string acoustic guitar.
Hedges covered a wide range of musical styles and was considered an extremely dynamic performer in concert. Hedges made ends meet playing and singing in pubs and restaurants in the Baltimore Metro area during his tenure at Peabody. From 1976 to 1977 he played electric guitar and flute for a local jazzy folk rock group called Lotus Band, which he left to start performing solo acoustic. In 1980, he made plans to move to California to study music at Stanford University.
Hedges was contacted in February 1981 by William Ackerman who heard Hedges performing at The Varsity Theater in Palo Alto and immediately (using a napkin from The New Varsity) signed Hedges to a recording contract on the Windham Hill label.
Hedges' first two recordings for Windham Hill—Breakfast in the Field and Aerial Boundaries—were milestones for the acoustic guitar. He wrote nearly exclusively in alternate tunings. His early recordings and most of the Breakfast in the Field album were recorded on the Ken DuBourg guitar and his Martin D-28 "Barbara". 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 damping 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 TransTrem 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 Hedges' records.
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