Kittyhawk Plays “Big City” From the PBS Special “First Flight”.

Recorded at Paul Edward’s home in Deep Cove, North Vancouver, Canada. The tune highlights double pull off chords, melody and bass solos.

Bortz and Edwards are not novices in the world of professional music.  Hailing from Chicago, where Daniel Bortz began playing guitar at 14. Then moving to Phoenix for High School where Daniel joined different rock groups.  The next 10 years found him working as a part-owner and operator of a recording studio and teaching himself guitar and absorbing influences from Glen Gouldl to Wes Montgomery.  It was also during this time that Bortz became disenchanted with a steady diet of rock and roll; so to provide himself with a new artistic release he gave up the recording studio and studied cello at Arizona State University.

In 1973, Bortz decided to leave Phoenix for LA, and he kept himself spiritually and financially occupied by composing and playing for various modern dance companies and playing numerous recording projects.  When he chanced upon the Guitar Player Magazine feature on Emmett Chapman and the Stick, he was captivated by it.  His ideas about music and the course he was to follow in the profession seemed to crystallize.

Paul Edwards, too was similarly affected by the Stick.  Born in Kansas City, but grew up in Southern California.  At age five he began taking piano lessons, and when he was 12 he became interested in singing and in folk guitar.

During high school Paul picked up acoustic and electric bass, but when he decided to attend college after graduation he became a dance major.  At California State University-Fullerton, Edwards continued to play acoustic guitar, gigging in small clubs around the area.  He moved to LA after college, and in 1974 he was on the same bill with Emmett Chapman-who at the time had been fine tuning his new invention.  Edwards was so impressed with the Stick that he gave up all his other instruments and pursued it full-time from 1975 to the present.

Richard Elliot has a new album, Rock Steady, is Now Available at
ITunes and Amazon!

With a bestselling discography of over 15 recordings since 1986’s Initial Approach, thousands of live dates spanning over two decades and one of the largest and most loyal fan bases in contemporary urban jazz, it’s incredible to hear Elliot declare: “What I’m doing now, enjoying this upward trend in my career, is seriously the most fun I have ever had.” Then again, the multi-talented tenorman, composer and producer has been on one of the most incredible rolls of his career since the 2005 release of Metro Blue, which debuted at #2 on Billboard’s Contemporary Jazz chart.

See the dates for the Jazz Attack 2010 Tour with Richard, Rick Braun and Jonathan Butler.

Kittyhawk performs “Islands” from the PBS special “First Flight”.

Kittyhawk performs their song “Race for the Oasis” from the PBS special “First Flight”.

Kittyhawk performs their song “Kilimanjaro” from the PBS special “First Flight”

Kittyhawk plays “Bells of Taliesin” from the PBS show “Kittyhawk First Flight”.