David Byrne
(born May 14, 1952) is a Scottish-American musician and artist perhaps best known as a founding member and principal songwriter of the new wave band Talking Heads, which was active between 1974 and 1991. Since then, Byrne has released his own solo projects on record, and worked in a variety of media, including film, photography, opera, and Internet-based projects. He has received Grammy, Oscar, and Golden Globe awards for his achievements.
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DAVID BYRNE TICKETS
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Early years
Byrne was born in
Dumbarton,
Scotland. Two years later, his parents moved to
Hamilton, Ontario,
Canada, and then to
Arbutus, Maryland, when he was 8 or 9 years old. He graduated from
Lansdowne High School in southwest
Baltimore County. Byrne started his musical career in a high school duo named Bizadi with Mark Kehoe. Their repertoire consisted mostly of songs such as "April Showers", "96 Tears", "Dancing On The Ceiling", and
Frank Sinatra songs. Byrne then attended the
Rhode Island School of Design for one year before dropping out and forming a band called "The Artistics" with fellow RISD student
Chris Frantz.
[1] The band dissolved within a year, and the two moved to New York together with Frantz's girlfriend
Tina Weymouth. Unable to find a bass player in New York, Frantz and Byrne persuaded Weymouth to start playing bass guitar, and together with
Jerry Harrison they formed the group
Talking Heads which had its first gig in 1975.
[2] [3]
During his time in the band, Byrne took on outside projects, collaborating with
Brian Eno in 1981 on the album
My Life in the Bush of Ghosts
, which attracted considerable critical acclaim and featured a groundbreaking use of
sampling.
Byrne married costume designer
Adelle Lutz in 1987. They have a daughter, Malu Abeni Valentine Byrne, born in 1989. Byrne and Lutz divorced in 2004. Byrne currently lives in
New York City.
Varied work
thumb in 1978 Photo: Jean-Luc Ourlin
In 1981, Byrne partnered with
choreographer Twyla Tharp,
scoring "The Catherine Wheel," a ballet prominently featuring unusual rhythms and lyrics. Productions of "The Catherine Wheel" appeared on
Broadway that same year.
In Spite of Wishing and Wanting
is a soundscape David Byrne produced for the Belgian dance company
Ultima Vez.
His work has been extensively used in
movie soundtracks, most notably in collaboration with
Ryuichi Sakamoto and
Cong Su on
Bernardo Bertolucci's
The Last Emperor
, which won an Oscar for Best Original Score. In 2004,
Lead Us Not Into Temptation (music from the film "Young Adam")
included tracks and musical experiments from his score to
Young Adam. Byrne also wrote, directed, and starred in
True Stories
, a musical collage of quirky
Americana released in 1986. He wrote and produced most of the music in the movie as well. Byrne also directed the documentary
Île Aiye
and the concert film of his 1992 Latin-tinged tour titled
Between the Teeth
. He was chiefly responsible for the stage design and choreography of
Stop Making Sense
in 1984.
Byrne wrote the
Dirty Dozen Brass Band-inspired score for
Robert Wilson's Opera
The Knee Plays
from
The CIVIL warS
. Some of the music from Byrne's orchestral album
The Forest
was originally used in a Wilson-directed theatre piece with the same name.
The Forest
premiered at the Theater der Freien Volksbühne, Berlin in 1988. It received its New York premiere in December 1988 at BAM, the Brooklyn Academy of Music. The
Forestry Maxi-single contained dance and industrial remixes of pieces from The Forest by
Jack Dangers, Rudy Tambala, and Anthony Capel.
Byrne also appeared as a guest vocalist/guitarist for
10,000 Maniacs during their
MTV Unplugged concert, though the songs in which he is featured were cut from its album. One of them, "Let the Mystery Be", appeared as the fourth track on
10,000 Maniacs' CD single "Few and Far Between".
Byrne also worked with "Queen of Tex-Mex",
Tejano superstar
diva Selena, writing, producing and singing a song ("God's Child (Baila Conmigo)"), included on Selena's last album, "
Dreaming of You", before Selena's untimely death.
Byrne was the host of "
Sessions at West 54th" during its second of three seasons.
Byrn also collaborated with members of Devo and Morcheeba to recordan album called Feeelings in 1997.
Luaka Bop
Byrne founded
Luaka Bop, a
world music record label which releases the work of artists
Cornershop,
Os Mutantes,
Los De Abajo,
Jim White,
Zap Mama,
Tom Zé,
Los Amigos Invisibles among others.
[4]
Byrne is also a visual artist, and has shown his work in
contemporary art galleries and museums around the world since the 1990s. He has also created a number of public art installations, many of them anonymous. He is represented by
Pace/MacGill Gallery, NYC. In 2008 he designed nine bike racks around Brooklyn and Manhattan: .
Recent musical activity
In 2001 a censored version of Byrne's single "
Like Humans Do" was selected by
Microsoft as the sample music for
Windows XP to demonstrate
Windows Media Player (not included in SP2 installs).
[5] [6] The next year, he provided vocals for a track, "Lazy" by
X-Press 2, which reached number 2 in the
United Kingdom and number 1 on the U.S. Dance Charts. David said in an interview in
BBC Four Sessions's coverage of his Union Chapel performance that Lazy was number 1 in
Syria.
In April 2003, Byrne appeared as himself in an episode of
The Simpsons
, "
Dude, Where's My Ranch?".
In late 2003, Byrne released a book with a companion DVD called
Envisioning Emotional Epistemological Information
(ISBN 3-88243-907-6). The work included artwork composed entirely in
Microsoft PowerPoint. It includes one image that depicts, according to Byrne, "
Dan Rather's profile. Expanded to the nth degree. Taken to infinity. Overlaid on the back of
Patrick Stewart's head."
[7]
Byrne's latest solo album,
Grown Backwards
, was released on March 16, 2004 by Nonesuch. This album used orchestral string arrangements, and includes two operatic arias. He also launched a North American and Australian tour with the Tosca Strings. This tour ended with Los Angeles, San Diego and New York shows in August 2005. The following year, his singing was featured on "The Heart's a Lonely Hunter" on
The Cosmic Game
by
Thievery Corporation.
In 2005, Byrne initiated his own internet radio station, Radio David Byrne.
[8] Each month, Byrne posts a playlist of music he likes, linked by themes or genres. Byrne's playlists have included African Popular Music; Rednecks, Racists, & Reactionaries: Country Classics; Vox Humana; Classical Opera; Italian Movie Music. Byrne also posts personal comments on the music and, occasionally, on the state of the recorded music industry. In July 2007, Byrne posted the following comment:
"ref">[9]
Returning to this work in the theatre, in late 2005 Byrne and
Fatboy Slim began work on
Here Lies Love
, a
disco opera or
song cycle about the life of
Imelda Marcos, the controversial former
First Lady of the
Philippines. Some music from this piece was debuted at
Adelaide Festival of Arts in
Australia in February 2006 and the following year at
Carnegie Hall on February 3, 2007.
Byrne and
Eno's influential 1981 album
My Life in the Bush of Ghosts
was re-released for its 25th anniversary in early 2006, with new bonus tracks. In keeping with the spirit of the original album, two of the songs' component tracks were released under
Creative Commons licenses and a remix contest site was launched. Later that same year, Byrne released
Arboretum
, a sketchbook facsimile of his Tree Drawings, published by
McSweeney's. He also had an exhibition of his chairs — drawings, photographs, sculptures, and embroideries — at Pace/MacGill Gallery, NYC.
Byrne was profiled in the
New York Times in January, 2007.
[10] The article refers to his April 15, 2006 journal entry, in which he wrote: "I was a peculiar young man — borderline
Asperger's, I would guess."
[11]
In 2007, David Byrne provided a cover of
The Fiery Furnaces' song "Ex-Guru" for a compilation to celebrate the 15th birthday of
Thrill Jockey, a Chicago-based label.
In April 2008 Byrne took part in the
Paul Simon retrospective concert series at BAM performing "
You Can Call Me Al" and "I Know What I Know" from Simon's
Graceland
album.
[12]
In 2008, Byrne and his band programmed the Battery Maritime Building, a 99-year-old
ferry terminal in
Manhattan, to play music.
[13] Essentially Byrne has taken the old New York City building, hooked the entire structure - pipes, heaters, pillars and all, electronically to an old pipe organ, and made a playable musical instrument of it, for a piece called "
Playing the Building".
This project is markedly similar to an installation of his that ran in 2005 in
Stockholm,
Sweden,
[14] and to a series of installations performed by New Zealand and Detroit based artists
Alastair Galbraith and
Matt De Genaro, recorded on their 1998 record
Wire Music
and 2006 follow-up
Long Wires in Dark Museums, Vol. 2
.
thumb in April 2009
Byrne and Eno reunited for 2008's
Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
and Byrne assembled a band to tour the album and other collaborations between the two through late 2008.
[15] He assembled a band to tour worldwide for the album for a six-month period from late 2008 through early 2009 on the
Songs of David Byrne and Brian Eno Tour. The day after that album was released,
Big Love: Hymnal
- his soundtrack to season two of
Big Love
was made available. These two albums constituted the first releases on his personal
independent record label Todo Mundo.
He is featured on the tracks "Money" and "The People Tree", on
N.A.S.A.'s 2009 album
The Spirit of Apollo
.
David Byrne appeared on
HIV/
AIDS charity album
Dark Was the Night
for
Red Hot Organization in 2009. He collaborated with
Dirty Projectors on the song "Knotty Pine".
David Byrne performed at the 2009
Bonnaroo Music Festival in Manchester, Tennessee.
Cycling
Byrne is also known for his activism in support of increased cycling, and for having used a bike as his main means of transport for most of his life, especially cycling around New York, where he has designed innovative bicycle parking racks, as image outlines.
[16] He has written widely on cycling, including a 2009 book,
Bicycle Diaries
.
[17] In August 2009, he auctioned his Montague folding bike in order to raise money for the London Cycling Campaign.
Discography
Byrne has released a number of studio albums as well as scores and soundtracks, live albums, a remix album, and several singles. His main studio albums include:
- My Life in the Bush of Ghosts
(with Brian Eno) (1981)
- Rei Momo
(1989)
- The Forest
(1991)
- Uh-Oh
(1992)
- David Byrne
(1994)
- Feelings
(1997)
- Look into the Eyeball
(2001)
- Grown Backwards
(2004)
- Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
(with Brian Eno) (2008)
References
- Gittins, Ian, ''Talking Heads: Once in a Lifetime : the Stories Behind Every Song'', Hal Leonard Corporation, 2004, p.140 ISBN 0634080334, 9780634080333
- Tina Talks Heads, Tom Toms, and How to Succeed at Bass Without Really Trying Gregory Isola, ''Bass Player Magazine'', retrieved November 23, 2008.
- Talking Heads ''Rock and Roll Hall of Fame'', retrieved November 23, 2008.
- Official site Cited June 30, 2009
- David Byrne to Provide Promotional Music for Windows XP: "Like Humans Do" to Give Music Fans a Taste of the Digital Music Experience in Windows XP
- You May Find Yourself On Windows XP - Forbes.com
- Wired 11.09: Learning to Love PowerPoint
- Radio David Byrne
- Radio David Byrne, June 2007: "I Still Buy CDs!"
- Indie Rock’s Patron Saint Inspires a New Flock - New York Times
- David Byrne Journal: 4.15.06: Military revolt, back pages
- David Byrne joins Paul Simon on stage in New York, NME
- David Byrne Converts Building Into Giant Instrument
- David Byrne Playing the Buildingurl=http://www.fargfabriken.se/index.php?tabell=content&id=1&imgnr=6
- Tour Dates for David Byrne - Songs of David Byrne and Brian Eno
- David Byrne, Cultural Omnivore, Raises Cycling Rack to an Art Form, NY Times, 8 Aug 2008
- Rocker/bike activist David Byrne announces Portland event