Hornsby, Bruce

Hornsby, Bruce, one of the most challenging musical storytellers of the 1980s and 1990s; b. Williams-burg, Va., Nov. 23, 1954. Music was a family affair for Bruce Hornsby. His maternal grandfather was a theater organist and supervised music in schools. His father played sax in his uncle’s band. Through high school, Hornsby played piano in the hotel lounges of Williams-burg and elsewhere throughout the southern states with his brother Bobby’s band. After a stint at the Univ. of Miami (attending with such heavyweights as Pat Metheny and Jaco Pastorius), he returned to music- making with fellow alum, drummer John Molo, a fixture in Hornsby’s bands since. When he went to try his skills in L.A., he worked for three years writing songs for 20th Century-Fox with his younger brother John.

In the early 1980s, Hornsby worked with other musicians and recorded countless demos. He played keyboards in Sheena Easton’s band and befriended artists including Huey Lewis. All that hard work and determination worked out, as he and his band The Range signed to RCA in 1985.

Their debut album, The Way It Is, went triple platinum, reaching #3 in the charts. A balladeer, Hornsby sang of homelessness and social responsibility in his cool baritone, weaving little duplet fillegrees into the title track. Despite its flying in the face of the feel-good, love song pop of the time, the tune topped the pop and AC charts and won ASCAP’s “Song of the Year” in 1987 as the most played song on American radio. They followed with the #4 “Mandolin Rain,” which also topped the AC chart, and “Every Little Kiss,” which hit #14 in a remixed version. The band won 1996’s Best New Artist Grammy.

After spending close to a year on the road, Hornsby and The Range put out Scenes from the Southside. The album went platinum, climbing to #5. It featured the hits “The Valley Road” (#4 pop, #1 AC) and “Look Out Any Window” (#35 pop). Hornsby’s compositions and collaborations were also getting notice. Huey Lewis topped the charts with his version of a tune from Scenes,“Jacob’s Ladder.” Hornsby cowrote, coproduced, and played piano on Don Henley’s hit single “The End of the Innocence.”

The Range’s 1990 swan song, A Night on the Town, found the band fairly bursting to try something new. Hornsby’s piano work was becoming jazzier as John Molo’s drumming became more aggressive. The album went gold and spawned the #18 single “Across the River.” Ironically, Hornsby won a Grammy in 1990, but as a songwriter, for a bluegrass version of “The Valley Road” on the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s Will the Circle Be Unbroken II.

For the next couple of years, Hornsby worked with the spectrum of stars in contemporary pop music, including Bob Dylan; Crosby, Stills Nash and Young; Bob Seger; Willie Nelson; Bonnie Raitt; Squeeze; jazz sax player Bill Evans; and Shawn Colvin. He became an honorary member of The Grateful Dead, filling in on the road after keyboard player Brent Mydland died. Hornsby cut a track with Branford Marsalis called “Barcelona Mona” for the 1992 Olympics that wound up winning a Best Pop Instrumental Performance Grammy in 1993. He worked with Robbie Robertson, who encouraged him to show a little more “bad Bruce” on some of his albums. He also built a studio on his property.

When he finally got busy on his first post-Range record in 1993, he put together a bunch of his friends, including Branford Marsalis, Jerry Garcia, Pat Metheny, Fishbone, and drummer John Bigham. Harbor Lights is a looser, funkier, jazzier album than anything he had done before, and pointed a new direction for Hornsby. Without benefit of a hit single or much radio play, the album still went gold.

In 1995, Hornsby put together the star-studded Hothouse.The album had almost as many music juxtapositions as it did lyrical ones: On “Cruise Control” the soul band Black Street and Jerry Garcia played together. Soul singer Chaka Khan and nouveau banjo picker Bela Fleck both got paired with jazz stringbender Pat Metheny. Songs quoted Sam Cooke, John Coltrane, and Theloni-ous Monk.

In 1998, Hornsby released a double CD, Spirit Trail, an album that built on the funkiness of his previous two releases. Hornsby started exploring new technology and expanded his piano skills, and wrote one of his best crop of songs. The album, however, didn’t produce any hits. He continues to tour, play and explore, and if he doesn’t sell as well as he once did, he continues to grow as an artist.

Discography

therange:The Way It Is (1986); Scenes from the Southside (1988); A Night on the Town (1990). solo:Harbor Lights (1993); Hot House (1995); Spirit Trail (1998).

—Hank Bordowitz