Ralph Towner (born March 1, 1940) is an American multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger and bandleader. He plays the

twelve-string guitar A twelve-string guitar (or 12-string guitar) is a steel-string guitar with 12 strings in six courses, which produces a thicker, more ringing tone than a standard six-string guitar. Typically, the strings of the lower four courses are tuned in o ...

classical guitar The classical guitar (also known as the nylon-string guitar or Spanish guitar) is a member of the guitar family used in classical music and other styles. An acoustic wooden string instrument with strings made of gut or nylon, it is a precursor o ...

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis a ...

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

and

French horn The French horn (since the 1930s known simply as the horn in professional music circles) is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. The double horn in F/B (technically a variety of German horn) is the horn most ...

Biography

Towner was born into a musical family in

Chehalis, Washington Chehalis ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Lewis County, Washington. The population was 7,439 at the time of the 2020 census. Incorporated in 1883, Chehalis was primarily a logging and railroad town, with a shift towards farming in the m ...

, United States. His mother was a piano teacher and his father a trumpet player. Towner learned to improvise on the piano at the age of three. He began his career as a conservatory-trained classical pianist, attending the

University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc Nike, Inc. ( or ) is a ...

from 1958-1963, where he also studied composition with

Homer Keller Homer T. Keller (b. Oxnard, California, February 17, 1915; d. Upland, California May 12, 1996) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. He graduated from Oxnard Union High School in Oxnard, California in 1933, after which he ...

. He studied classical guitar at the Vienna Academy of Music with Karl Scheit from 1963–64 and 1967-68. He joined world music pioneer

Paul Winter Paul Winter (born August 31, 1939) is an American saxophonist, composer, and bandleader. He is a pioneer of world music and earth music, which interweaves the voices of the wild with instrumental voices from classical, jazz and world music. The ...

's "Consort" ensemble in the late 1960s. He first played jazz in New York City in the late 1960s as a pianist and was strongly influenced by the renowned jazz pianist

Bill Evans William John Evans (August 16, 1929 – September 15, 1980) was an American jazz pianist and composer who worked primarily as the leader of his trio. His use of impressionist harmony, interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, block ch ...

. He began improvising on classical and 12-string guitars in the late 1960s and early 1970s and formed alliances with musicians who had worked with Evans, including flautist

Jeremy Steig Jeremy Steig (September 23, 1942 – April 13, 2016)Peter Keepnews, "Jeremy ...

, bassists

Eddie Gómez Edgar Gómez (born October 4, 1944) is a Puerto Rican jazz double bassist, known for his work with the Bill Evans Trio from 1966 to 1977. Biography Gómez moved with his family from Puerto Rico at a young age to New York, where he was raised. ...

, Marc Johnson,

Gary Peacock Gary George Peacock (May 12, 1935September 4, 2020) was an American jazz double bassist. He recorded a dozen albums under his own name, and also performed and recorded with major jazz figures such as avant garde saxophonist Albert Ayler, pianis ...

, and drummer

Jack DeJohnette Jack DeJohnette (born August 9, 1942) is an American jazz drummer, pianist, and composer. Known for his extensive work as leader and sideman for musicians including Charles Lloyd, Freddie Hubbard, Keith Jarrett, Bill Evans, John Abercrombie ...

. Along with bandmates Paul McCandless, Glen Moore, and

Collin Walcott Collin Walcott (April 24, 1945 – November 8, 1984) was an American musician who worked in jazz and world music. Early life Walcott was born in New York City, United States. He studied violin and tympani in his youth, and was a percussion stu ...

, Towner left the Winter Consort in 1970 to form the group

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

, which over the course of the 1970s issued a number of influential records mixing folk music,

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area, the List of countries and dependencies by population, second-most populous ...

n classical forms, and

avant-garde jazz Avant-garde jazz (also known as avant-jazz and experimental jazz) is a style of music and improvisation that combines avant-garde art music and composition with jazz. It originated in the early 1950s and developed through to the late 1960s. Ori ...

-influenced free improvisation. At the same time, Towner began a longstanding relationship with the

ECM ECM may refer to: Economics and commerce * Engineering change management * Equity capital markets * Error correction model, an econometric model * European Common Market Mathematics * Elliptic curve method * European Congress of Mathemat ...

record label, which has released virtually all of his non-Oregon recordings since his 1973 debut as a leader '' Trios / Solos''. Towner appeared as a sideman on

Weather Report Weather Report was an American jazz fusion band active from 1970 to 1986. The band was founded in 1970 by Austrian virtuoso keyboardist Joe Zawinul, American saxophonist Wayne Shorter, Czech bassist Miroslav Vitouš, American drummer and vocalis ...

's 1972 album '' I Sing the Body Electric''. His 1975 album ''

Solstice A solstice is an event that occurs when the Sun appears to reach its most northerly or southerly excursion relative to the celestial equator on the celestial sphere. Two solstices occur annually, around June 21 and December 21. In many count ...

'', which featured a popular track called "Nimbus", demonstrated his skill and versatility to the full using a 12-string guitar. Since the early 1990s, Towner has lived in Italy, first in

Palermo Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital of both the autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The city is noted for its ...

and then in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

Technique

Towner eschews amplification, using only six-string nylon-string and 12-string steel-string guitars. As a result, he tends to avoid high-volume musical environments, preferring small groups of mostly acoustic instruments that emphasize dynamics and group interplay. Towner also obtains a percussive effect (e.g., "Donkey Jamboree" from '' Slide Show'' with

Gary Burton Gary Burton (born January 23, 1943) is an American jazz vibraphonist, composer, and educator. Burton developed a pianistic style of four-mallet technique as an alternative to the prevailing two-mallet technique. This approach caused him to be h ...

) from the guitar by weaving a matchbook among the strings at the neck of the instrument. Both with

and as a solo artist, Towner has made significant use of

overdubbing Overdubbing (also known as layering) is a technique used in audio recording in which audio tracks that have been pre-recorded are then played back and monitored, while simultaneously recording new, doubled, or augmented tracks onto one or more av ...

, allowing him to play piano (or synthesizer) and guitar on the same track; his most notable use of the technique came on his 1974 album ''

Diary A diary is a written or audiovisual record with discrete entries arranged by date reporting on what has happened over the course of a day or other period. Diaries have traditionally been handwritten but are now also often digital. A personal ...

'', in which he plays guitar-piano duets with himself on most of the album's eight tracks. In the 1980s, Towner began using the

Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 The Prophet-5 is an analog synthesizer manufactured by the American company Sequential. It was designed by Dave Smith and John Bowen in 1977, who used microprocessors, then a new technology, to create the first polyphonic synthesizer with f ...

synthesizer extensively, but has since de-emphasized his synthesizer and piano playing in favor of guitar.

Honors

Two

lunar craters Lunar craters are impact craters on Earth's Moon. The Moon's surface has many craters, all of which were formed by impacts. The International Astronomical Union currently recognizes 9,137 craters, of which 1,675 have been dated. History The wor ...

were named by the

Apollo 15 Apollo 15 (July 26August 7, 1971) was the ninth crewed mission in the United States' Apollo program and the fourth to land on the Moon. It was the first J mission, with a longer stay on the Moon and a greater focus on science than ear ...

astronauts An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member aboard a spacecraft. Although generally r ...

after two of Towner's compositions, "Icarus" and "Ghost Beads."

Discography

As leader

* 1972: '' Trios / Solos'' with Glen Moore (

, 1973) * 1973: ''

'' (ECM, 1973) * 1974: ''

'' (ECM, 1975) * 1975: '' Matchbook'' with

(ECM, 1975) * 1976: ''

Sargasso Sea The Sargasso Sea () is a region of the Atlantic Ocean bounded by four currents forming an ocean gyre. Unlike all other regions called seas, it has no land boundaries. It is distinguished from other parts of the Atlantic Ocean by its charac ...

'' with John Abercrombie (ECM, 1976) * 1977: '' Solstice/Sound and Shadows'' (ECM, 1977) * 1978: ''

Batik Batik is an Indonesian technique of wax-resist dyeing applied to the whole cloth. This technique originated from the island of Java, Indonesia. Batik is made either by drawing dots and lines of the resist with a spouted tool called a ''ca ...

'' (ECM, 1978) * 1979: '' Old Friends, New Friends'' (ECM, 1979) * 1979: '' Solo Concert'' (ECM, 1980) – live * 1981: '' Five Years Later'' with John Abercrombie (ECM, 1982) * 1982: '' Blue Sun'' (ECM, 1983) * 1985: '' Slide Show'' with Gary Burton (ECM, 1986) * 1988: '' City of Eyes'' (ECM, 1989) * 1991–92: ''

Open Letter An open letter is a letter that is intended to be read by a wide audience, or a letter intended for an individual, but that is nonetheless widely distributed intentionally. Open letters usually take the form of a letter addressed to an indiv ...

'' (ECM, 1992) * 1988–92: ''If You Look Far Enough'' with Arild Andersen, Nana Vasconcelos (ECM, 1993) * 1993: ''

Oracle An oracle is a person or agency considered to provide wise and insightful counsel or prophetic predictions, most notably including precognition of the future, inspired by deities. As such, it is a form of divination. Description The word ...

'' with Gary Peacock (ECM, 1994) * 1995: '' A Closer View'' with Gary Peacock (ECM, 1998) * 1996: '' Lost and Found'' (ECM, 1996) * 1995: '' Ana'' (ECM, 1997) * 2000: ''Verso'' with Maria Pia De Vito (Provocateur, 2000) * 2000: ''

Anthem An anthem is a musical composition of celebration, usually used as a symbol for a distinct group, particularly the national anthems of countries. Originally, and in music theory and religious contexts, it also refers more particularly to short s ...

'' (ECM, 2001) * 2005: ''

Time Line A timeline is a display of a list of events in chronological order. It is typically a graphic design showing a long bar labelled with dates paralleling it, and usually contemporaneous events. Timelines can use any suitable scale representin ...

'' (ECM, 2006) * 2007: '' From A Dream'' with Wolfgang Muthspiel and Slava Grigoryan (Material Records, 2008) * 2008: ''

Chiaroscuro Chiaroscuro ( , ; ), in art, is the use of strong contrasts between light and dark, usually bold contrasts affecting a whole composition. It is also a technical term used by artists and art historians for the use of contrasts of light to achi ...

'' (ECM, 2009) * 2012: ''

Travel Guide A guide book or travel guide is "a book of information about a place designed for the use of visitors or tourists". It will usually include information about sights, accommodation, restaurants, transportation, and activities. Maps of varying det ...

'' with Wolfgang Muthspiel, Slava Grigoryan (ECM, 2013) * 2016: '' My Foolish Heart'' (ECM, 2017)

As group

Atmosphere * ''Atmospheres Featuring Clive Stevens & Friends'' (Capitol, 1974) * ''Voyage to Uranus'' (Capitol, 1974)

* ''Music of Another Present Era'' (Vanguard, 1972) * ''Distant Hills'' (Vanguard, 1973) * ''Winter Light'' (Vanguard, 1974) * ''In Concert'' (Vanguard, 1975) * ''Together'' (Vanguard, 1976) * ''Friends'' (Vanguard, 1977) * '' Out of the Woods'' (Elektra, 1978) * ''Violin'' (Vanguard, 1978) * ''Roots in the Sky'' (Elektra, 1979) * ''Moon and Mind'' (Vanguard, 1979) * ''In Performance'' (BGO, 1980) * ''Our First Record'' (Vanguard, 1980) * ''

'' (ECM, 1983) * '' Crossing'' (ECM, 1985) * ''

Ecotopia ''Ecotopia: The Notebooks and Reports of William Weston'' is a utopian novel by Ernest Callenbach, published in 1975. The society described in the book is one of the first ecological utopias and was influential on the counterculture and the g ...

'' (ECM, 1987) * ''45th Parallel'' (Portrait, 1989) * ''Always, Never, and Forever'' (veraBra, 1991) * ''Troika'' (veraBra, 1994) * ''Beyond Words'' (Chesky, 1995) * ''Northwest Passage'' (ECM, 1997) * ''Music for a Midsummer Night's Dream'' (Oregon Music, 1998) * ''Oregon in Moscow'' (ECM, 2000) * ''Live at Yoshi's'' (ECM, 2002) * ''Prime'' (C.A.M. Jazz, 2005) * ''1000 Kilometers'' (C.A.M. Jazz, 2007) * ''In Stride'' (C.A.M. Jazz, 2010) * ''

Family Tree A family tree, also called a genealogy or a pedigree chart, is a chart representing family relationships in a conventional tree structure. More detailed family trees, used in medicine and social work, are known as genograms. Representations ...

'' (C.A.M. Jazz, 2012) * ''Live in New Orleans'' (Hi Hat, 2016) * ''

Lantern A lantern is an often portable source of lighting, typically featuring a protective enclosure for the light sourcehistorically usually a candle or a oil lamp, wick in oil, and often a battery-powered light in modern timesto make it easier to ca ...

'' (C.A.M. Jazz, 2017) Paul Winter Consort * ''Road'' (A&M, 1970) * ''

Icarus In Greek mythology, Icarus (; grc, Ἴκαρος, Íkaros, ) was the son of the master craftsman Daedalus, the architect of the labyrinth of Crete. After Theseus, king of Athens and enemy of Minos, escaped from the labyrinth, King Minos sus ...

'' (Epic, 1972) * ''Earthdance'' (A&M, 1977)

As sideman or guest

With Horacee Arnold * ''Tribe'' (Columbia, 1973) * ''Tales of the Exonerated Flea'' (Columbia, 1974) With Jerry Granelli * ''Koputai'' (ITM Pacific, 1990) * ''One Day at a Time'' (ITM Pacific, 1990) With Vince Mendoza * ''Start Here'' (World Pacific, 1990) * ''Instructions Inside'' (Manhattan, 1991) With

Maria Pia De Vito Maria Pia De Vito is an Italian jazz singer, composer, and arranger. Career A native of Naples, Italy, she studied classical music, opera, and Italian folk music. In 1976 she performed folk songs as a singer, guitarist, and pianist. In 1980 she ...

* ''Nel Respiro'' (Provocateur, 2002) * ''Moresche e Altre Invenzioni'' (Parco Della Musica, 2018) With others *

Azimuth An azimuth (; from ar, اَلسُّمُوت, as-sumūt, the directions) is an angular measurement in a spherical coordinate system. More specifically, it is the horizontal angle from a cardinal direction, most commonly north. Mathematical ...

, ''

Départ ''Départ'' is an album by British jazz trio Azimuth, whose members were vocalist Norma Winstone, pianist John Taylor, and trumpeter Kenny Wheeler. It was recorded in December 1979 at Talent Studios in Oslo, and was released in 1980 by ECM. On t ...

'' (ECM, 1980) – recorded in 1979 * Bill Bruford, ''

If Summer Had Its Ghosts ''If Summer Had Its Ghosts'' is an album by drummer Bill Bruford on which he is joined by guitarist Ralph Towner and bassist Eddie Gómez. It was recorded in West Shokan, New York, in February 1997, and was released later that year by Discipline G ...

'' (Discipline Global, 1997) *

, '' Six Pack'' (GRP, 1992) *

Larry Coryell Larry Coryell (born Lorenz Albert Van DeLinder III; April 2, 1943 – February 19, 2017) was an American jazz guitarist. Early life Larry Coryell was born in Galveston, Texas, United States. He never knew his biological father, a musician. He ...

, ''

The Restful Mind ''The Restful Mind'' is an album by jazz guitarist Larry Coryell. It was recorded at Vanguard Records' New York City studio, and was released by Vanguard in 1975. It features Coryell on acoustic and electric guitars, along with three of the four me ...

'' (Vanguard, 1975) * Pino Daniele, ''Che Dio Ti Benedica'' (CGD, 1993) * Cyrus Faryar, ''Cyrus'' (Collectors' Choice Music, 2006) *

Robben Ford Robben Lee Ford (born December 16, 1951) is an American blues, jazz, and rock guitarist. He was a member of the L.A. Express and Yellowjackets and has collaborated with Miles Davis, Joni Mitchell, George Harrison, Larry Carlton, Rick Sprin ...

, ''

Blues Connotation ''Blues Connotation'' is an album by American blues guitarist Robben Ford. The album ''A Song I thought I heard Buddy Sing'' contains material from the same sessions and was released in 1993 under Jerry Granelli's name. Track listing #"City Lif ...

'' (ITM Pacific, 1997) * David Friesen, ''Waterfall Rainbow'' (Inner City, 1977) * Jan Garbarek, '' Dis'' (ECM, 1977) – recorded in 1976 * Egberto Gismonti, '' Sol Do Meio Dia'' (ECM, 1978) – recorded in 1977 * Gerri Granger, ''Add a Little Love'' (United Artists, 1972) * Trilok Gurtu, ''Usfret'' (CMP, 1988) *

Charlie Haden Charles Edward Haden (August 6, 1937 – July 11, 2014) was an American jazz double bass player, bandleader, composer and educator whose career spanned more than 50 years. In the late 1950s, he was an original member of the ground-breaking ...

, ''Helium Tears'' (NewEdition, 2005) *

Tim Hardin James Timothy Hardin (December 23, 1941 – December 29, 1980) was an American folk music, folk and blues music, blues musician and composer. As well as releasing his own material, several of his songs, including "If I Were a Carpenter (song), ...

, '' Bird on a Wire'' (Columbia, 1971) *

Keith Jarrett Keith Jarrett (born May 8, 1945) is an American jazz and classical music pianist and composer. Jarrett started his career with Art Blakey and later moved on to play with Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis. Since the early 1970s, he has also been a ...

, '' In the Light'' (ECM, 1974) – recorded in 1973 * Maria Joao, ''Fabula'' (Verve, 1996) * Joseph LoDuca, ''Glisten'' (Cornucopia, 1982) * Andy Middleton, ''Nomad's Notebook'' (Intuition, 1999) *

Duke Pearson Columbus Calvin "Duke" Pearson Jr. (August 17, 1932 – August 4, 1980) was an American jazz pianist and composer. ''Allmusic'' describes him as having a "big part in shaping the Blue Note label's hard bop direction in the 1960s as a record pro ...

, ''

I Don't Care Who Knows It ''I Don't Care Who Knows It'' is an album by American pianist and arranger Duke Pearson featuring performances recorded between 1968 and 1970.

'' (Blue Note, 1996) – recorded in 1968–70 *

Terry Plumeri Jon Terryl "Terry" Plumeri (November 28, 1944 – March 31, 2016) was an American musician, classical composer, orchestra conductor, double bassist, lecturer, teacher, producer, and film score composer. Early life Plumeri was born in Greensbo ...

, ''Ongoing'' (Airborne, 1978) *

Michel Portal Michel Portal (born 27 November 1935) is a French composer, saxophonist, and clarinetist. He plays both jazz and classical music and is considered to be "one of the architects of modern European jazz". Early life Portal was born in Bayonne on 2 ...

, ''Musiques De Cinemas'' (Label Bleu, 1995) *

, '' I Sing the Body Electric'' (Columbia, 1972) *

Kenny Wheeler Kenneth Vincent John Wheeler, OC (14 January 1930 – 18 September 2014) was a Canadian composer and trumpet and flugelhorn player, based in the U.K. from the 1950s onwards. Most of his performances were rooted in jazz, but he was also active i ...

, '' Deer Wan'' (ECM, 1978) – recorded in 1977

References

External links

Ralph Towner's Official WebsiteHome Page Bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Towner, Ralph 1940 births Living people 20th-century American guitarists 21st-century American guitarists American jazz guitarists ECM Records artists People from Chehalis, Washington University of Oregon alumni Oregon (band) members Paul Winter Consort members Jazz musicians from Washington (state)