Martin Bisi (born 1961) is an American producer and

songwriter A songwriter is a musician who professionally composes musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music ...

. He is known for recording important records by

Sonic Youth Sonic Youth was an American rock band based in New York City, formed in 1981. Founding members Thurston Moore (guitar, vocals), Kim Gordon (bass, vocals, guitar) and Lee Ranaldo (guitar, vocals) remained together for the entire history of t ...

Swans Swans are birds of the family Anatidae within the genus ''Cygnus''. The swans' closest relatives include the geese and ducks. Swans are grouped with the closely related geese in the subfamily Anserinae where they form the tribe Cygnini. Someti ...

John Zorn John Zorn (born September 2, 1953) is an American composer, conductor, saxophonist, arranger and producer who "deliberately resists category". Zorn's avant-garde and experimental approaches to composition and improvisation are inclusive of j ...

Material Material is a substance or mixture of substances that constitutes an object. Materials can be pure or impure, living or non-living matter. Materials can be classified on the basis of their physical and chemical properties, or on their geolo ...

Bill Laswell William Otis Laswell (born February 12, 1955) is an American bass guitarist, record producer, and record label owner. He has been involved in thousands of recordings with many collaborators from all over the world. His music draws from funk, ...

Helmet A helmet is a form of protective gear worn to protect the head. More specifically, a helmet complements the skull in protecting the human brain. Ceremonial or symbolic helmets (e.g., a policeman's helmet in the United Kingdom) without protect ...

, Unsane, The Dresden Dolls,

Cop Shoot Cop Cop Shoot Cop was a noise rock group founded in New York City in 1987. They disbanded in 1996. The band were frequently classified as industrial rock, but were often quite different from many bands so dubbed: having a distinctive instrumental l ...

, White Zombie,

Boredoms Boredoms () (later known as V∞redoms) is a rock band from Osaka, Japan formed in 1986. The band's sound is often referred to as noise rock, or sometimes Japanoise (Japan’s noise music scene), though their more recent records have moved towa ...

Angels of Light Angels of Light were an American folk band that was formed circa 1998 by singer-songwriter and musician Michael Gira after he disbanded Swans, the group he had founded in 1982. The band has marked a distinctly different style for Gira since he ...

J.G. Thirlwell James George Thirlwell (born 29 January 1960), also known as Clint Ruin, Frank Want, and Foetus, among other names, is an Australian musician, composer, and record producer. He is known for juxtaposing a variety of different musical styles. ...

, and

Herbie Hancock Herbert Jeffrey Hancock (born April 12, 1940) is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, and composer. Hancock started his career with trumpeter Donald Byrd's group. He shortly thereafter joined the Miles Davis Quintet, where he hel ...

Grammy The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...

-winning song " Rockit".

Early life

Martin Bisi was born in 1961 to Argentinian parents and grew up in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

. His mother was a concert pianist who specialized in

Liszt Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...

and Chopin and toured extensively, and his father played

tango Tango is a partner dance and social dance that originated in the 1880s along the Río de la Plata, the natural border between Argentina and Uruguay. The tango was born in the impoverished port areas of these countries as the result of a combina ...

-style piano as a hobby. As a child in the 1960s his parents sent him to a French school, gave him music lessons, and took him to performances by the

New York Philharmonic The New York Philharmonic, officially the Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York, Inc., globally known as New York Philharmonic Orchestra (NYPO) or New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra, is a symphony orchestra based in New York City. It is ...

and the

opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libr ...

, all of which he rebelled against.

Career

In 1981, he started ''B.C. Studio'' (initially named OAO, Operation All Out, Studio) with

and

Brian Eno Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop a ...

in the Gowanus section of

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

, where he recorded much of the No Wave, avant garde, and hip-hop of the early 1980s including

Lydia Lunch Lydia Lunch (born Lydia Anne Koch; June 2, 1959)Martin Charles Strong. ''The Great Indie Discography''. 2003, page 85 is an American singer, poet, writer, actress and self-empowerment speaker. Her career began during the 1970s New York City no ...

Live Skull Live Skull is a post-punk/experimental rock band from New York City, formed in 1982. In an overview of their abrasive no wave-influenced music, ''Trouser Press'' said, "As part of the same New York avant-noisy scene that spawned Sonic Youth, Lyd ...

Fred Frith Jeremy Webster "Fred" Frith (born 17 February 1949) is an English multi-instrumentalist, composer, and improviser. Probably best known for his guitar work, Frith first came to attention as one of the founding members of the English avant-rock ...

and

Afrika Bambaataa Lance Taylor (born on April 17, 1957), also known as Afrika Bambaataa (), is an American DJ, rapper, and producer from the South Bronx, New York. He is notable for releasing a series of genre-defining electro tracks in the 1980s that influence ...

. In 1982, he recorded the instruments for the first song

Whitney Houston Whitney Elizabeth Houston (August 9, 1963 – February 11, 2012) was an American singer and actress. Nicknamed "Honorific nicknames in popular music, The Voice", she is Whitney Houston albums discography, one of the bestselling music artists ...

recorded as a lead singer, "

Memories Memory is the faculty of the mind by which data or information is encoded, stored, and retrieved when needed. It is the retention of information over time for the purpose of influencing future action. If past events could not be remembered, ...

" off of Material's '' One Down'' LP.
Soon after recording

's " Rockit", Bisi split from

but continued working from BC Studio till present time, with a specialty in loud, dense sound, such as

Foetus A fetus or foetus (; plural fetuses, feti, foetuses, or foeti) is the unborn offspring that develops from an animal embryo. Following embryonic development the fetal stage of development takes place. In human prenatal development, fetal develo ...

and

Serena Maneesh Serena-Maneesh (previously spelled Serena Maneesh, sometimes shortened to S-M) is a Norwegian alternative rock band from Oslo. Biography The team of musicians who each contribute to the band's sound is organized around songwriter Emil Nikolais ...

. In 2021, he worked with the ''Hypnagogia'' album of Travis Duo.

Solo career

Bisi also recorded his own material * ''Creole Mass'' (LP -1988 New Alliance/ SST) with

Lee Ranaldo Lee Mark Ranaldo (born February 3, 1956) is an American musician, singer-songwriter, guitarist, writer, visual artist and record producer, best known as a co-founder of the alternative rock band Sonic Youth (guitar and vocals). In 2004, ''Rolling ...

and

* ''All Will Be Won'' (LP -1992 New Alliance/ SST) * ''See Ya in Tiajuana'' (EP -1994 New Alliance/ SST) * ''Dear Papi I'm in Jail'' (EP -1996 New Alliance/ SST) * ''Milkyway of Love'' (LP -1999 Stripmine) * ''Sirens of the Apocalypse'' (LP -2008 Labelship, Black Freighter) * ''Son of a Gun'' (EP -2010 Contraphonic, Black Freighter) with

Brian Viglione Brian Viglione (born May 16, 1979, in Greenville, New Hampshire) is an American drummer best known for his work with The Dresden Dolls and Violent Femmes. He was also a prominent member of New York City's cabaret punk orchestra The World/Inferno ...

of The Dresden Dolls and

Bob D'Amico Bob D'Amico is an American drummer. He is best known as the drummer for indie rock bands The Fiery Furnaces and Sebadoh. Discography With Set On Stun Studio albums * '' Reveals the Shocking Truth...'' CD (1998, Distance Formula Recordings) ...

Sebadoh Sebadoh () is an American indie rock band formed in 1986 in Northampton, Massachusetts, by Eric Gaffney and Lou Barlow, with multi-instrumentalist Jason Loewenstein completing the line-up in 1989. Barlow co-created Sebadoh as an outlet for hi ...

* ''Ex Nihilo'' (LP -2014 Labelship, Black Freighter) * ''Solstice'' (LP -2019 Bronson Recordings) In 2009, Bisi made his first extensive touring in the US and Europe. In 2014 he toured in support of a feature-length documentary about BC Studio, ''Sound & Chaos: "The Story Of BC Studio"'', directed by Sara Leavitt and Ryan Douglass. In January 2016, Bisi celebrated the 35 year anniversary of his BC Studio with a weekend of performances by close to 50 musicians who'd worked there over the decades. These were recorded and then worked into an album called ''BC35'', released on April 20, 2018 on Bronson Recordings.
Bisi continues to tour in support of ''BC35'' with his band, called Martin Bisi band, which involves a revolving cast of musicians.

References

External links

Martin Bisi's official websiteBC35 official websiteOfficial website of Sound & Chaos: The Story Of BC Studio documentaryMartin Bisi on YouTubeMartin Bisi on FacebookMartin Bisi on Twitter
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bisi, Martin Record producers from New York (state) Songwriters from New York (state) Living people Musicians from Brooklyn American people of Argentine descent 1961 births Place of birth missing (living people)