BRIAN SETZER

(Biography)

“The power of music not only gave me something to live for, it became my basis for life. Besides getting me out of a lot of trouble and getting me through hard times, it’s what I breathe and what I live for.”

Brian Setzer has been living and breathing music since he was seven years old when he and his mom popped into a pizza parlor and heard a new band on a jukebox that, in his words, “blew me away.” That new band was The Beatles, and as Setzer recalls, even then, his seven-year-old ears knew that it was the guitar that made the sound he loved. For nearly four decades, Setzer and his signature Gretsch guitar have been making a sound that legions of fans worldwide love–and likely breathe and live for, too.

Sonically, since 1979 Setzer has been swinging from rockabilly to, well, swing, jumping from blues to boogie-woogie, and even adapting compositions by Beethoven and Mozart (the would-be Lennon and McCartney of their day). He’s put his stamp--and guitar licks--on myriad genres, all without missing a beat. As a member of a very elite club of artists who’ve had not one, not two, but three super successful phases in a career, Brian Setzer’s first musical life began when he, along with Slim Jim Phantom and Lee Rocker, left Long Island and landed in London at the dawn of a new decade and immediately rocked the town. With the helpful and steady hand of singer/songwriter/producer Dave Edmunds, The Stray Cats commenced to scratch and claw their way to the top of the charts.

2017 marks the milestone 25^th anniversary of The Brian Setzer Orchestra (BSO), whose self-titled debut album kicks off with the track “Lady Luck.” So, how lucky does the three-time Grammy Award winner feel to still be playing the music he wants to play after all this time? “Well, when I started playing with The Stray Cats, I was taking this outdated music that most people hadn’t heard of, and I just loved the feel and the rawness of it. And [that music] moved The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, too. I dusted it off and I kinda put my stamp on it. And when I wanted to try another musical idea and put BSO together, people just laughed at me. It feels like I’ve taken this monumental, impossible task and have been able to do this for 25 years. It’s an incredible feeling.”

In the 90s, Setzer’s second musical life emerged with the formation of The Brian Setzer Orchestra, which is credited – and rightfully so – with mining a second bedrock genre of American music: swing. “I don’t know how that got started,” Setzer says of music scribes dubbing him the new king of swing. “I don’t look at it that way. I just take all the music I love and put it all together in a big bowl of chili, really. Blues, jazz, country, rockabilly, swing, rock and roll. I just mix it all up. I don’t know why or what I choose from those genres, that’s just what comes out.”

The third of Setzer’s trinity of career triumphs is his well-established tradition of making Christmas cool. Not unlike Nat King Cole, The Brian Setzer Orchestra has become synonymous with making the Yuletide season swing, rock and boogie. This past Christmas, BSO wrapped (or unwrapped, if you will) its 13^th annual Christmas Rock! Tour, featuring music off their four holiday hits collections, including 2016’s Rockin’ Rudolph.  When asked by the San Francisco Chronicle whether or not he even likes Christmas music, Setzer said unflinchingly, “That’s the only thing I listen to over the holidays. Even the biggest Grinch can get mushy.”

On August 2 this year, The Brian Setzer Orchestra will officially celebrate its 25^th birthday with a bash at the iconic Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. With so many historic venues to choose from, why pick this place to throw the party? “You know, who doesn’t want to play the Hollywood Bowl?” Setzer says rhetorically. “When the Hollywood Bowl was conceived, all music was acoustic, so to hear a big band in this setting is ultimate.  This venue has a nice wooden stage.  It just sounds amazing. The construction of the shell overhang provides excellent acoustics.” According to Setzer, fans lucky enough to score tickets to the August 2 soiree can expect that “magic” to include songs from his entire career, starting with The Stray Cats, segueing into “some of the big band stuff that everybody knows,” plus “some things that I haven’t played in a long time.”

Master musicians like Brian Setzer seemingly feel equally at home whether they’re fronting a 3-piece band or a 19-piece orchestra. Mastering the musical metamorphosis one would need to go through to be equally comfortable onstage with both configurations would seem an almost impossible task. Not for Setzer. “You’re still playing with the same feeling. I still want it to be a rock and roll experience. I don’t want it to be this kind of snobby jazz experience because that’s not what I am. It has to be rockin’!” Onstage, Setzer is a generous musician, in that he lets the boys in the band do their thing. He gives them room to roam on their individual instruments. “That’s one of the pleasures of being a musician. I mean I love hearing the guys play. That’s a beautiful thing. Absolutely!”

There’s been no stopping Brian Setzer, a "Musician's Musician" credited with continually taking chances with innovative and daring musical styles.  Setzer is widely credited for taking two forgotten genres, rockabilly and swing, adding his own blend of gunpowder and rockin’ style, and completely reinventing and single-handedly resurrecting them in the process.  Along the way, he has scored chart-topping hits, sold 13 million records and received the Orville H. Gibson Lifetime Achievement Award throughout his decorated career as founder/leader of the Stray Cats, his 19-piece Brian Setzer Orchestra, and as a solo artist. He is consistently cited as one of the world’s greatest living guitarists, and has a best-selling, extensive line of elite Gretsch signature model guitars bearing his name. Brian appeared in the 1987 film, La Bamba, portraying rockabilly pioneer Eddie Cochran. In 2002, Brian earned the privilege of being one of the few musicians to be animated in an episode of “The Simpsons.” That same year, Setzer was personally requested to induct Chet Atkins into the 17th Annual Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  Setzer had the honor of being invited in 2006 to perform at the White House for the President of the United States. In 2014, Setzer received the distinct honor of being asked by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. to donate a replica of his original 1959 Gretsch 6120 “Stray Cat” guitar, joining an elite collection of iconic treasures at the museum.

Some things are just meant to be. “There’s no doubt that as I get older I realize, what else could I have been put here to do except to play? I was put here to play that guitar; that’s certainly obvious, and that’s really what it’s all about for me. Life’s too short to do it any other way.”

###