Steve Willis (guitar) has played in countless bands over a 30 year span. Willis began on acoustic bass where he made his presence felt in Portland, Oregon in the 70's and 80's. Steve has worked variously as a musician, actor and teacher. He has performed since the late 60's in a huge variety of musical styles, from country to free jazz, and was known as Portland's most versatile bassist in the 70's and early 80's. After a lengthy stint in NYC, Steve took up the guitar in 1990 and moved back to Oregon, infecting Corvallis with his peculiar and methodical madness.
Ryan Biesack is a drummer, percussionist and educator who maintains an active teaching and performing schedule in the jazz, rock and improvised music worlds. He holds both a Bachelor of Music Performance from the University of Wisconsin Stevens Point and a Master of Music in Jazz Studies from the University of Oregon. Biesack has been an instructor of music and drum set at Oregon State University since 2009, where he teaches drum set, The History of Rock & Roll, Reggae History, and directs the OSU Jazz Ensemble. Biesack has played professionally for over a decade, and has performed with Ron Miles, Hashem Assadullahi, Wayne Horvitz, Douglas Detrick, Ganesh Anandan, Konorak Reddy, Dylan Fowler, Halie Loren, Mile Denny and many others. In addition to being in demand locally as a performer and clinician, he has played and taught throughout the midwest, the west coast, New York City, India, South Korea and most recently in Nepal at the Kathmandu Jazz Conservatory. Biesack works with ensembles ranging in scope from straight-ahead and swinging to cutting edge, modern, improvised and new music. Some of Biesack's most recent playing can be heard with NYC based saxophonist Hashem Assadullahi’s Sextet, whose latest Origin Records release, “Pieces," features dynamic original jazz compositions performed by a stellar line-up of musicians, featuring the unparalleled Ron Miles on trumpet. Ryan is also a Crescent Cymbals Artist as of 2013. |