BJORN SOLLI
Bjorn Solli - Guitarist/Composer was born in Norway in 1979 and is now based in New York. He was voted "young Norwegian jazz musician of the year" in 2002 and has since won numerous awards throughout Europe, including soloist prizes in Belgium, Monaco and Spain, audience prizes in Spain and at the Montreux Jazz Festival, and a composition prize in France.
With his trio SOLID! he has released 3 critically acclaimed CD's distributed worldwide. In 2005 Solli toured Nepal and India for three weeks, and in 2007 he toured in USA, China, Vietnam, Sweden, Ireland and Norway. In November 2007 Solli was back in India on a two-week tour with his trio.
In April 2008 Bjorn went on another world tour, first in California, then China and a two week trio tour in Australia before going to Ireland and one week in Norway doing a CD release tour.
In July 2008 Bjorn once again toured around China and in August he went on tour in Norway with saxophonist Will Vinson.
Bjorn Solli is a busy professional musician working out of New York City performing in such venues as Dizzy's Club at Lincoln Centre, The Bitter End, LaLanterna, Louis 649, Manahatta, Puppet's, 55 Bar and Blues Alley in Washington DC, with such musicians as Jon Gordon, Marcus Strickland, Will Vinson, Kendrick Scott, Matt Penman, Orlando Le Flemming, Obed Calvaire, Bryn Roberts, Matt Clohesy, Tommy Crane, Derek Nievergelt, Quincy Davis, Karlie Bruce, Rodney Green, Wayne Batchelor, Jonathan Blake, Mark Ferber, Jochen Rueckert, Jon Wikan, Orrin Evans, Ferenc Nemeth, Jamire Williams, Ingrid Jensen, Adam Cruz, Jaleel Shaw etc.
He is touring and recording extensively, having so far appeared on 6 Cd's. Solli is a member of MTV-featured R&B-singer Noora Noor's band and in 2005 he performed at the Nelson Mandela concert in Tromso, Norway in front of 18.000 spectators. He has opened for artists such as Alicia Keys, Manhattan Transfer, Anthony Hamilton, Jean Luc Ponty, Peter Gabriel, Robert Plant, Annie Lenox etc. He has also toured in Russia with Kid Andersen, and Ireland with John Moriarty, played at the Ibiza Jazz festival and sung and played for a million viewers on national television.
You can visit his MySpace.com page.
Recordings below with Doug Wamble on Grace and Spot