BIO


"It’s perfectly understandable why connoisseurs of fine music often refer to Scott Sawyer as a jazz guitarist. It’s because he does the jazz thing so well. He’s an expert at breathing new life into that old graveyard of American Popular Song. By artfully reinvestigating this body of familiar melodies and picking through the harmonic bones, Dr. Scott has resuscitated many a standard.

Jazz, however, is merely one of the many tools within his gig bag. He fingers the blues electric with the authenticity of someone who has lived them. That’s not all. With country-boy affability, he strums and twangs. Chicken-picks. Shucks. Jives. Funks it up. And then breaks your heart with that one poignant love note that’s soft as an angel’s wing.

Like his better-known contemporaries John Scofield & Bill Frisell, Sawyer was weaned on the Beatles, the blues & ‘Bird’. You can hear it in everything he plays, a new kind of guitarspeak comprised of pop, improv and sounds never before heard. It is a language Sawyer uses with authority."---(Joe Vanderford)

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Scott Sawyer displays his musical diversity like a badge of honor, re-visiting his blues & rock roots while continuing to explore the jazz tradition & beyond. He's performed at countless venues here and abroad (Asia, Brazil, Canada, Central America, Europe, the Middle East) including prestigious festivals & concert halls, music clubs and beer-soaked dives.

Sawyer has toured extensively with jazz singer Nnenna Freelon and was a member of the 1992 Philip Morris Superband which featured jazz icons Phil Woods, Jimmy Heath, Kenny Barron and Bob Cranshaw, as well as rising stars Joshua Redman, Christian McBride and others. Other tours include Central America with vibraphonist Jon Metzger (USIA, Arts America Program). Sawyer has shared the stage and/or recorded with many notable artists, including Charlie Byrd, David Murray, Jack Wilkins, prima ballerina Marie-Christine Mouis, Willie Pickens, Ed Thigpen, Bruce Piephoff, Buster Williams, Oteil Burbridge, Bill Anschell, Mel Melton and the Wicked Mojos, Lois Deloatch, Ghezzi, and actor Danny Aiello.

Sawyer's latest album “GO THERE” charted on XM Radio and features Oteil and Kofi Burbridge (Tedeschi-Trucks Band). Numerous sideman recording credits include Bruce Piephoff's "Still Looking Up at the Stars" (2012, produced by Sawyer); Dave Fox's "The Meldavians-Farewell to Arigemon" (2012); Nnenna Freelon's "Homefree" (2010) plus her 1997 Grammy-Nominated "Shaking Free", “Live” (at the Kennedy Center; 2003) and "Listen" (1993); Lois Deloatch's “Roots: Jazz, Blues Spirituals” (Sawyer co-produced); Gary Brunotte's “Manic Moments” and Bill Anschell's “a different note all together”. He arranged & recorded “The Glory Of Love” w/ Danny Aiello; as featured in the Cinecom film "Once Around". Additional new recordings are slated for completion/release in 2012.

Sawyer is an adjunct Instructor at East Carolina University (Greenville, NC). He also offers private instruction to guitarists and non-guitarists, as well as clinics & master classes. He's been a featured artist-clinician/speaker at numerous venues, including Duke University; UNC-Chapel Hill; The Institute of the Arts @ Duke University; UNC-Greensboro; University of Wisconsin; University of South Florida. From 1989-1993 he was a Durham Arts Council CAPS artist, presenting numerous public school residencies.

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"The ABB will continue what’s being called the “40 Years of Highs and Lows” tour, all part of a 60 date US tour. While in NY, I got to do a gig with Go There, who I recorded with in 2006. Scott Sawyer and Kenny Soule are two of my favorite musicians to play with." - Oteil Burbridge (Chris Jisi, Bass Player Magazine (Jun 01, 2009)

"Welcome to Scott Sawyer, the funk, rock, blues--and jazz-- player...With a preponderance of Sawyer tunes, (GO THERE) is all groove underneath...If you're looking for a pure, hard-line jazz album, this is not it. But if you think it represents a compromise, think again. It's its own species." - Owen Cordle, News & Observer (May 06, 2007)

(on Scott Sawyer “Go There”) "I've been a fan of Scott Sawyer's music for years and consider him to be one of the greatest guitarists in the country. That there are so few recordings of him available is one of the music world's great injustices. Compounding this difficulty is that his playing is so damn good in so many diverse styles, which means there are still a lot of CDs to make if the public is going to have an inkling of his gift. Go There is Scott at his genre-busting best. What would you call this? "fusion"? "jazzy jamband"? In the end it doesn't matter: this is just cool music, from the soul, with inventive writing, fantastic players, and heartfelt improvisations. Go wherever you have to to get a copy of this disc." -- Alex Martin

"I remember hearing years ago about "...this guy Scott Sawyer...He's the one guy around here who has a totally cool vibe while being one of the best guitar players in the region." The guy who said that was Brian Dennis and he was right. - John Custer; Producer (Dag, Cry Of Love, COC) "

"I did do one CD with this great guitarist named Scott Sawyer. Its called “Go There”. My brother Kofi played on it and a great drummer named Kenny Soule. These guys are really amazing." - Oteil Burbridge (badassbassplayers.com (Jun 05, 2007)

"We just completed a project called Go There. Just ridiculous, man...They have a guitarist, Scott Sawyer and a drummer Kenny Soule...We went into the studio and did this and I felt like we had been playing together for thirty years. It was just amazing how natural it was." - Oteil Burbridge (jambands,com )

…we're pleased to play Scott's music...it sounds great on the air and fits the channel perfectly. Keep up the great work...” – Russ Davis (Program Director, XM Radio “Beyond Jazz”; 11/16/07)

"Scott Sawyer is one of North Carolina’s guitar masters... To this listener, Go There sounds like a righteous amalgam of jazz, funk, rock and blues performed by a crew of very solid players. For immediate inspiration, check the brilliant, funkified arrangement of George Harrison’s “Tax Man.” " - Philip van Vleck (Metro Magazine)

(on Ed Paolantonio's "Dad's Blues")….Sawyer grabs you on the title cut with soul and intellect, sort of like bluesman B.B. King meeting jazzman Jim Hall---N&O; (Raleigh, NC)

(on Ghezzi's "Taking No Prisoners")...Vocalist Ghezzi and guitarist extraordinaire Scott Sawyer pack a solid blues punch on this fine outing... Sawyer delves deep into his bluessoaked Chicago roots, equally at home on rockin' blues or coolly perfect weepers like "Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out."---Gene Hyde (Spectator; Raleigh, NC)

"(Charlie) Byrd played amplified acoustic guitar, Sawyer electric guitar. As an accompanist, Sawyer subtly shadowed Byrd. As a soloist, he paced himself thoughtfully and showed much rhythmic variety. He occasionally evoked Wes Montgomery and Jim Hall...throughout the concert, Byrd was a generous leader, swapping solos and phrases with Sawyer"...)---Owen Cordle (N&O; Raleigh, NC)

"A thoughtful improviser, Sawyer selects notes carefully from among the many that lie beneath his fingers. Like master trumpeter Miles Davis, who punctuated his solos with pockets of emptiness, Sawyer lets each note find its own gravity before moving on to the next. But just when you think you've got him nailed as an aw-shucks guitarist who picks unobtrusively in the shadows, one listen to Stream reveals Sawyer's alter ego: a boisterous blues man who honks nasty and loud... "Blue Diner" jolts like a boiling cup of coffee."---Joe Vanderford (The Independent Weekly; Durham, NC)

..."There is refinement in his ability to develop, bend and restructure a line. His compositions and extrapolative improvisation insinuate themselves into your mind.......Sawyer's NC sideman are as cogent and hip as their more nationally recognized counterparts."---Owen Cordle (N&O; Raleigh, NC)

"(Sawyer) obviously enjoys the bop and Coltrane-style free improvisational genres. On those tracks where he uses a sax, he lets the horn player lead with good effect.....there are a pair of selections which I've always felt were the guitar's forte-a gentle ballad and a melodic piece that builds in intensity with each successive pass. He uses each to effectively demonstrate his own strengths."---Paul Matthews (CADENCE)

"The album's title brings to mind third stream jazz, in this instance mixing electric guitar with acoustic instruments to invent compositions with rock, straightahead, and new music elements. In The Stream is an engaging yet uncompromisingly provocative effort for the serious jazz listener."---Wayne Self (JazzSouth)

"This is meaty, modern, modal stuff. Key is Sawyer's playing: No strummy sloshing around here; it's dead-on, down to the last well-placed blue note. This is an adventuresome group."---Dean Smith (Charlotte News & Observer)

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