SIR RICHARD BISHOP is renowned for his mercurial guitar-playing for 26 years with Seattle ethno-delic legends Sun City Girls, but he has wrought a distinguished solo canon as well. He combines soulfulness and advanced technique with a panache that’s nearly unrivalled among today’s guitarists. Bishop strums spiritual with incantatory ragas, free-folk excursions, crystalline flamenco flourishes, ruddy Appalachian folk, Middle Eastern-tinged fantasias and gypsy arabesques. This is eclecticism done with respect and third-eye-dilating filigree; his compositions attain a sepia-toned wistfulness and a psychedelic complexity.

Bishop’s first solo record, ‘Salvador Kali’, was released by John Fahey’s esteemed Revenant Records label in 1998. Locust Music issued his second record, ‘Improvika’ (2004), which consisted of nine extemporaneous pieces for solo acoustic guitar. More recently ‘Tangier Sessions’, was released by Drag City in 2015. It consists of a series of improvisations recorded in Tangier, Morocco in 2014 using a 19th century parlour guitar of mysterious origin. Bishop's latest album, ‘Hillbilly Ragas ‘was released last September to widespread acclaim, whilst Drag City are currently prepping new title ‘Hillbilly Erotica’ as a speculative, avant-garde sequel to his stripped-back acoustic explorations.

https://sirrichardbishop.com/