Read the Big Joe Daddy Interview below and share it on social media.
Please tell our readers who you are and what you do?
Big Joe Daddy
….. is the brainchild of Joey Wisgirda. Rooted in psy-bass, and drawing upon years of 40 years of experience playing trumpet in jazz, funk, reggae, and salsa bands, where he performed with such luminaries as Alton Ellis John Tchicai, and the Mutaytor, his adventures led him to open for John Scofield, Galactic, Charlie Hunter, Pharaoh Sanders, Steve Kimock, and Zigaboo Modeliste. Experiments with wahs and delay pedals led to the current evolution of laptop-driven sets utilizing Ableton Live and a live performance with a Morrison Digital Trumpet ( digitaltrumpet.au ), a special wind controller for trumpet players that has allowed Joe to overcome the limitations of performing a strictly acoustic instrument.
https://soundcloud.com/dj-big-joe-daddy
Joe's music is similar in spirit to modern psy-bass composers like Amon Tobin and Dave Tipper. He brings with him a jazz composer's arranging sensibilities that provides a fresh turn on the music, often collaborating with other jazz players like guitarists Rick zamora ( Curtis mayfield, Janis Joplin ) and Mark Oi ( Clinton Fearon ).
Joey was an instructor at the UCDavis experimental college from 2008-2011, teaching electronic music He is a founding member of Chillage Records and the Chillage People electronic music collective along with Spoken Bird, Elevated Mind, Urple Eeple, Secret Recipe, and Devin Kroes …
How would you describe your influences and how have they changed over the years?
I started off playing trumpet ( 40myears ago ) in concert band and the orchestra in school, as well as classical small ensemble ( brass choirs and baroque ensembles – I play piccolo trumpet as well ), and attended a prep school at the New England Conservatory in Boston, Mass for high school students wishing to attend music college later. However, my folks didn't want me going to NEC, so I got my degree in physics from Worcester Poly Tech and later from UC Davis.
At Davis I started playing out in funk, salsa, afrobeat and jazz groups, getting to know the music of Miles, Coltrane, The Meters, James Brown, Zappa, Sun Ra, Fela, and Irakire. This led to performing with dance music groups in Sacramento and the SF Bay Area and getting to open up for my heroes when they came to town. This time period culminated with two years studying composition and improv under jazz giant John Tchicai ( Albert Ayler, Coltrane ).
After attending Burning Man and seeing Bassnectar and Tipper for the first time ( the next year I did monitors for those two at El Circo, which I helped produce ) I knew I wanted to be part of creating 2st century music. To this end, I bought a computer and some synths and a copy of Acid and started making loop based creations. I bought a Morrison Digital Trumpet ( a special wind controller for Trumpet Players ) and started creating my take on IDM. I didn't want to create dance music specifically, but was more interested in what people like Four Tet, Prefuse 73, and Caribou were doing with their collabs with live players, especially what Four Tet was doing with Drummer Steve Reid.
I returned to Davis when I had my daughter, did live sound for awhile to pay the bills, and opened up a speakeasy in that back of my house that hosted after-hours bass parties. The Luna Lounge became somewhat of a legend in town. At. At the same time I was teaching a class on production at the UCDavis experimental college, I was able to pull many of the students from this class into a listening group that met once a week at my place. This group ( including Spoken Bird ( Alex Gonzales ) and Elevated Mind ( Will Bauer ) ) later picked up new members from Sacramento and moved to Oakland CA to form Chillage Records, as we started booking ourselves into gigs and festivals like Wormhole Wednesday ( Wormhole Organizer Benji Hannus, who goes by Secret Recipe, is also part of our collective ), and releasing music compilations with up-and coming artists like CharlesTheFirst.
We found ourselves performing all over California and the West Coast, at festivals like Symbiosis, Serenity Gathering, Cascadia NW Festival, StillDream, Burning Man, How Weird Street Fair, Organic Fest and many more …… once more performing, but this time alongside a new generation of heroes like Bogtrotter, Kll Smth, Mr. Bill and KJ Sawka, Eprom, Vibesquad, Ott, Clozee, and many many more …
Right now I have been busy working on a new set of uptempo psybass material for festivals, downtempo material for chill moments, and trying to take time tin the new years to collab with other instrument players.
What´s new right now?
I am hoping to have material for two albums out by April of this years, and to have myself booked at a few festivals this summer, but wish to focus more on composing and releasing.
You can follow me on soundcloud.com/dj-big-joe-daddy ( kind of a misnomer since I am not much of a dj ), I will be posting new material there as it comes out.
You can also find me on spotify :
https://open.spotify.com/artist/32Rys82yeRqZy5eE5fcdha
Here also are links to my current releases :
Astral Circus, released on Chillage Records
https://chillagerecords.bandcamp.com/album/astral-circus
A Few Of My Friends Vol 1 with Rick Zamora and Mark OI, on Street Ritual Records :
http://music.streetritual.com/album/a-few-of-my-friends-vol-1
Cascadia Shuffle, released on Street Ritual
http://www.streetritual.com/big-joe-daddy-cascadia-shuffle/
Clown Car, also on Street Ritual ( this was created with samples from the Grateful Dead's Mickey Hart )
http://www.streetritual.com/big-joe-daddy-clown-car-free-dl/
and my first release, 11:11 on Swamp Music
https://swampmusic.bandcamp.com/album/11-11
The best way for my friends and fans to support me would be to follow me on soundcloud and spotify. Also share my music as much as possible with other people who might like it!!
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Are you a superfan of anyone? How did you become a superfan? Do you remember how you become a fan and what turned you into super fan? Have you ever thought about why you´re such a fan?
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What was the biggest mistake you made when you started making music and what would be the number one tip you could give to a newcomer musician?
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How do you get gigs? Can you share any tips?
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Do you have good promotion tips for other musicians?
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Do you have insights on how to grow your audience on soundcloud that you want to share with our audience?
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What has been your biggest challenge right now? Have you been able to overcome that challenge? If so, how?
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How do you personally discover new music?
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Once you discovered new music, do you tell others about the new music/artist you discovered? If yes, how exactly?
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What is your number one tip to improve your music production or songwriting skills?
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What is your best tip for those who struggle with finishing their tracks?
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We meet again in one year. What has changed?
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http://www.soundcloud.com/dj-big-joe-daddy
http://www.facebook.com/djbigjoedaddy
https://chillagerecords.bandcamp.com/album/astral-circus
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Enter your questions to the artist in the facebook comment section below.
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