Artist: Bruce Hornsby

Bruce Randall Hornsby is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. His music draws from folk rock, jazz, bluegrass, folk, Southern rock, country rock, jam band, rock, heartland rock, and blues rock musical traditions.

Hornsby has won three Grammy Awards: a 1987 Grammy Award for Best New Artist with Bruce Hornsby and the Range, a 1990 Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Recording, and a 1994 Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance.

Hornsby has worked with his touring band Bruce Hornsby and the Noisemakers, his bluegrass project with Ricky Skaggs, and as a session and guest musician. He was a touring member of the Grateful Dead from September 1990 through March 1992, playing over 100 shows with the band.

He studied music at the University of Richmond for a year, at the Berklee College of Music for two semesters, and then at the University of Miami, where he graduated in 1977.

Following his graduation from the University of Miami in 1977, Hornsby returned to his hometown of Williamsburg, and played in local clubs and hotel bars. In 1980, he and his younger brother and songwriting partner John Hornsby moved to Los Angeles, where they spent three years writing for 20th Century Fox. Before moving back to his native Hampton Roads, he also spent time in Los Angeles as a session musician. In 1982, Hornsby joined the band Ambrosia for their last album Road Island and can be seen in the band's video for the album's single "How Can You Love Me". After Ambrosia disbanded, he and bassist Joe Puerta performed as members of the touring band for Sheena Easton. In 1984, Hornsby appeared in the music video for Easton's single Strut.

In 1984, Hornsby formed Bruce Hornsby and the Range, who were signed to RCA Records in 1985. Besides Hornsby, Range members were David Mansfield (guitar, mandolin, violin), George Marinelli (guitars and backing vocals), former Ambrosia member Joe Puerta (bass guitar and backing vocals), and John Molo (drums).

Hornsby's recording career started with the biggest hit he has had to date, "The Way It Is". It reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in December 1986. The song described aspects of homelessness, the American civil rights movement and institutional racism. It has since been sampled by at least six rap artists, including Tupac Shakur, E-40, and Mase.

With the success of the single, the album The Way It Is received the RIAA certification of multi-platinum. It included "Mandolin Rain" (co-written, as many of Hornsby's early songs were, with his brother John), another top-five hit. "Every Little Kiss" peaked at number 14 on the Billboard Hot 100 in July 1987. Other tracks on the album helped establish what some labeled the "Virginia sound", a mixture of rock, jazz, and bluegrass. Bruce Hornsby and the Range won the Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 1987, beating out Glass Tiger, Nu Shooz, Simply Red, and Timbuk3.

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, Hornsby worked extensively as a producer and sideman, producing a comeback album Anything Can Happen for Leon Russell. In 1987, Hornsby collaborated with Irish group Clannad, playing and lending vocals to their single "Something to Believe In". Hornsby also appears on the official music video release for the track. In 1989, Hornsby co-wrote and played piano on Don Henley's hit "The End of the Innocence". In 1991, he played piano on Bonnie Raitt's hit "I Can't Make You Love Me". He also appeared on albums by Bob Dylan, Robbie Robertson, Crosby Stills and Nash, Stevie Nicks and Squeeze.

He slowly began to introduce jazz and bluegrass elements into his music, first in live performance settings and later on studio work. In 1989, he first performed at the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. He also reworked his hit "The Valley Road" with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band for their album Will the Circle Be Unbroken: Volume Two. In February 1990, the song won Best Bluegrass Recording at the 32nd Annual Grammy Awards.

In May 1990, he released A Night on the Town, on which he teamed up with jazz musicians Wayne Shorter (tenor saxophone) and Charlie Haden (double bass) as well as bluegrass pioneer Bela Fleck (banjo). In concert, Hornsby and the Range began to stretch out their songs, incorporating more and more "freewheeling musical exchanges". Critics praised the album for its production, its political relevance, and Hornsby's gestures toward expanding out of a strictly pop sound by incorporating jazz and bluegrass.