Tish Ciravolo is a Los-Angeles-based bass guitar player and guitar designer, and the president and founder of

Daisy Rock Guitars Daisy Rock Girl Guitars is a guitar company founded in 2000 by Tish Ciravolo. The company, currently a subsidiary of KMCMusicorp, KMC Music, produces electric guitar, electric and steel-string acoustic guitar, acoustic guitars, bass guitars and u ...

Early years

Ciravolo grew up in

Merced, California Merced (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Mercy") is a city in, and the county seat of, Merced County, California, Merced County, California, United States, in the San Joaquin Valley. As of the 2020 Census, the city had a population of 86,333, up ...

, where her best friend Barbara taught her to play guitar while they were in high school. Ciravolo — whose first exposure to a female playing rock bass guitar was

Suzi Quatro Susan Kay Quatro (born June 3, 1950) is an American singer, bass guitarist, songwriter, and actress. In the 1970s, she scored a string of hit singles that found greater success in Europe and Australia than in her homeland, reaching No. 1 in th ...

as Leather Tuscadero on ''

Happy Days ''Happy Days'' is an American television sitcom that aired first-run on the ABC network from January 15, 1974, to July 19, 1984, with a total of 255 half-hour episodes spanning 11 seasons. Created by Garry Marshall, it was one of the most succ ...

'' — was a quick learner and by age 16 was on tour with a band called Plateau. When Plateau played in Kansas City, she decided to stay there and enrolled in Penn Valley Community College as a journalism and business major. After receiving her degree, she moved to Los Angeles, where she balanced a series of day jobs (including waitress at Duke's Coffee Shop and assistant to

Jay Leno James Douglas Muir Leno (; born April 28, 1950) is an American television host, comedian, writer, and actor. After doing stand-up comedy for years, he became the host of NBC's ''The Tonight Show'' from 1992 to 2009. Beginning in September 2009 ...

and his former manager, the late

Helen Kushnick Helen Kushnick ( Gorman; August 18, 1945 – August 28, 1996) was the talent agent of comedians Jimmie Walker, Elayne Boosler, and Jay Leno for much of her early career. Leno had been performing stand-up comedy in a variety of venues when sh ...

) with amateur night performances at

The Improv The Improv is a comedy club franchise. It was founded as a single venue in the Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan, Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of New York City in 1963, and expanded into a chain of venues in the late 1970s. History Originally, it was a ...

and

Comedy Store The Comedy Store is an American comedy club opened in April 1972. It is located in West Hollywood, California, at 8433 Sunset Boulevard on the Sunset Strip. An associated club is located in La Jolla, San Diego, California. History The Comedy ...

. Intent on being a rock star during the middle 1980s, she gravitated towards what became her primary instrument, the bass guitar. Like her influences

Simon Gallup Simon Jonathon Gallup (born 1 June 1960) is an English musician and bassist with the alternative rock band The Cure. He is the second longest-serving member of the band after lead vocalist/guitarist Robert Smith. Early years Born in Duxhurst ...

and

Tim Butler Timothy George Butler (born 7 December 1958) is an English musician and songwriter. He is the bass player, and co-founder of the Psychedelic Furs. He is also the youngest of three brothers. Richard, the eldest, is the lead singer of the Psych ...

, she played with a pick. "They kicked me out of the Dick Grove Music School after five minutes," she recalled, "because I didn't want to play with my fingers."

Bands

Ciravolo played in several bands, including Rag Dolls, The Velvets (a female Psychedelic Furs-type outfit), They Eat Their Own (new wave pop) and, eventually, her own group, Shiksa and the Sluts. Then she entered her "big hair metal phase", as the bass guitar player for Lypstik from 1988 to 1992. "We had a billboard on the side of the Roxy and everything," she said. "We did the windmill head shaking routine when we played, which was big at the time. We were also house band at the Whisky for a time, and played in the Battle of the Bitches at FM Station." Finding other creative outlets, Ciravolo also made two independent films (''The Wake'' and ''Birds & The Bees'') and wrote a sitcom with her partner Karen Peterson. In her early 30s, Ciravolo stopped performing for a while to have a family. "Through all those years of playing music, of great success and crushing disappointment, I always had so much fun," Ciravolo said. "It's physical, it's artistic, and it's who I am at heart. These days, I'm in this punk band called sASSafrASS, and we do covers like "

Cherry Bomb A cherry bomb (also known as a globe salute or kraft salute) is an approximately spherical exploding firework, roughly resembling a cherry in size and shape (with the fuse resembling the cherry's stem). Cherry bombs range in size from in diame ...

" by

The Runaways The Runaways were an all-female American rock band who recorded and performed from 1975 to 1979. The band released four studio albums and one live album during its run. Among their best-known songs are "Cherry Bomb", " Hollywood", "Queens of N ...

plus original material. I'm kind of over the whole 'getting the record deal thing', and it's more fun than I ever had before. If I got a record deal now, it would probably interfere with everything I'm doing with Daisy Rock".

Daisy Rock

Since being founded in 2000, Daisy Rock has increased in size, with 2006 sales reaching $2.4 million and Daisy Rock guitars and bass guitars available in more than 25 countries worldwide. The catalog includes acoustic and acoustic-electric guitars, electric guitars and electric bass guitars in a vibrant selection of colors. The company offers a range of models from popular lines such as the Butterfly, Daisy, Heartbreaker, Star, Pixie, Wildwood, Stardust Elite, Stardust Retro-H, Tom Boy and Rock Candy series. In 2007, it launched the Stardust Retro-H De-Luxe Series, the Rebel Rockit Series and the new Rock Candy Custom Special Bass, and released the very special Rock Candy Pink Label guitar that was hand crafted in the US by John Carruthers.

Publications

* ''Girl's guitar method 1: Everything a girl needs to know about playing guitar!'' Book and CD (Van Nuys, California:

Alfred Music Publishing Alfred Music is an American music publishing company. Founded in New York in 1922, it is headquartered in Van Nuys, California, with additional branches in Miami, New York, Germany, Singapore, and the United Kingdom. History In New York Cit ...

, 2002; ) * ''Girl's guitar method 2: Everything a girl needs to know about playing guitar!'' Book and CD by Ciravolo with

(Van Nuys, California:

, 2003; ) * ''Girl's bass method : everything a girl needs to know about playing bass!'' Book and CD (Van Nuys, California:

, 2005; ) * ''Girl's guitar method complete: everything a girl needs to know about playing guitar!'' Book and CD (Van Nuys, California:

, 2006; /Book only (2007),) * ''Girl's guitar method complete: everything a girl needs to know about playing guitar!'' DVD by

Janet Robin Janet Robin (born 1966) is an American guitarist, singer, songwriter, film and television composer, and guitar coach. Robin was named on the ''Top 50 Acoustic Guitarists Bonus List'' in '' Guitar Player '' in 2017. Early life Robin grew up in N ...

with Ciravolo. (Van Nuys, California:

, 2006; )

References

External links