vee device
SIDEMAN
www.rmchronicle.com“If it wasn’t for this thing, I’d be lost,” says Grant Gordy, gesturing toward a checkbook-sized day planner. Gordy, a professional guitarist and mandolinist based in Denver, can’t quite put a finger on the exact number of projects he is involved in.
“I guess I’m officially signed up for four or five,” he says, after a long pause.
Besides vee device, Gordy contributes to Arthur Lee Land, a Boulder-based outfit that calls itself “afrograss folk rock;” the Jayme Stone Quartet, an acoustic group immersed in contemporary jazz and bluegrass; and Interstate Cowboy, which plays western-swing. Gordy also often sits in with Fort Collins jazz pianist Mark Sloniker, and has played such diverse locales as Denver International Airport, a Central City casino and the home of Bronco’s head coach Mike Shanahan.
“My thing is just working as a general sideman in different situations,” says Gordy. “If you are lucky, in any given scene, you get involved in kind of a pool of musicians where if somebody needs a guitar player for this gig, there is a group of people that they can call. So I kind of freelance.”
This summer, Gordy was selected from hundreds of young musicians across the country who applied to new-grass bassist/classical composer Edgar Meyer’s workshop in New York City. The workshop attendees, a diverse selection of 15 musicians under age 30, spent a week learning and playing with Meyer as well as high-minded rootsy-veterans Bela Fleck and Mike Marshall. The week concluded with a performance at Carnegie Hall.
Gordy relished the opportunity.
“In some situations, Edgar and Mike would be critiquing, and in some situations, you would actually be playing in band situations with them,” he says. “Those are the cats who would be like a young jazz musician getting to study with Coltrane or Miles. To me, they are the top cats.”
As far as life freelancing on the Front Range goes, Gordy says he wouldn’t live it any other way.
“It’s really wonderful to have the kind of schedule where, even if you do a long gig, you are hardly ever going to work an eight-hour day,” he says. “It’s really nice, even with the uncertainty of not knowing whether or not you are going to get called for a gig. I’d rather do that than anything else.”
Rocky Mountain Chronicle -- Thursday, October 26, 2006
By Elliott Johnston