Tim Sparks Trio

Tim Sparks, guitar
Chris Bates, bass
Jay Epstein, drums

Tim talks with Pamela Espeland about Rio Nido, John Zorn and more on jazz.com

Tim Sparks is a guitar virtuoso with eclectic and wonderful taste.  He was raised in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and the music he heard around him was traditional country blues, and the gospel his grandmother played on piano in a small church in the Blue Ridge Mountains, so that’s what he taught himself to play.

He was nominated for a scholarship at the prestigious North Carolina School of the Arts. There he studied the classics with Andrés Segovia protegee Jesus Silva.

After college, he moved to Minneapolis, teaming up with Prudence Johnson and Tom Lieberman to form the seminal vocal jazz ensemble Rio Nido.  Sparks also became proficient in jazz styles from Brazilian to Bebop, which brought him several regional music awards including Best Acoustic Guitarist, Best Latin Jazz Guitarist, and Best Jazz Guitarist in the Minnesota Music Awards.

In 1993 he won the National Fingerstyle Guitar Championship at the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Kansas, playing his adaptation of The Nutcracker Suite by Tchaikovsky. (He worked out much of this adaptation while playing solo during Sunday brunch at the Dakotasome years ago.)

In the late 90s, Sparks had been immersed in the ethnic music scene, playing guitar in Greek and Klezmer orchestras.  He was a featured performer with Crossing Borders at the Bethlehem International Music Festival in July 1995 and has received two Arts Fellowships to pursue ethno-musicological studies. He spent one fall studying Fado and Portuguese guitar in Lisbon.

In 1989 he arranged Russian folk music for the Guthrie Theater’s adaptation of Uncle Vanya and in 1991 he was commissioned to compose music for Tienanmen, a ballet depicting the student uprising in China, for Myron Johnson’s Ballet of the Dolls.

In 2000, Sparks began an association with American composer John Zorn. He recorded three highly acclaimed CDs of Jewish Klezmer music adapted for acoustic fingerstyle guitar on Tzadik Records. He also earned a McKnight Fellowship to notate and edit the arrangements on Neshamah for publication.

Sparks has performed as an opening act for Dolly Parton and has performed on the same stage as Sandor Szabo, Franco Morone, Cyro Baptista, Isato Nakagawa and Bill Frisell. He has also performed on such national venues as A Prairie Home Companion, the main stage of the Winnipeg Folk Festival and the Chet Atkins Appreciation Society. He has performed at the Edenkoben Festival and the Dresden Guitar Festival in Germany and held a Jazz Guitar teaching residency in Lisbon, Portugal. He frequently tours Japan, France, Belgium, Austria and Hungary.

“I was at this show in Germany and Tim was one of the highlights (among Alex Degrassi, Leo Kottke, Ralph Towner, John Renbourn, Peter Finger, etc – an amazing gathering of the great acoustic guitarists). I’ve wanted to see Tim ever since.” – Techlectic on YouTube

Check out his playing on You Tube

More amazing guitar playing from Tim Sparks here

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