Corrections or additions?

This article by Elaine Strauss was published in U.S. 1 Newspaper on

October 20, 1999. All rights reserved.

Short Trip Home: Edgar Meyer

Defying categorization, "A Short Trip Home"

appears at McCarter Theater on Monday, October 25. Violinist Joshua

Bell ("The Red Violin"), second from right in the photo above,

bassist and composer Edgar Meyer, right, along with performers Sam

Bush, left, and Mike Marshall comprise the ensemble.

A bass player since the age of five (now 38), Meyer and his two younger

sisters grew up in Tennessee and all became musicians. His father,

with whom his studies began, was a jazz bassist. About his mother,

he says, "She sings very loud in church."

Meyer tracks his composing to his family acquiring a piano when he

was about 10. "I had been playing bass," he says. "Nothing

ever excited me more than being able to play more than one note at

a time. I wasn’t writing for bass until after the piano came."

He still practices piano, and quantifies his current piano playing

as consisting of more than 60 percent Bach; the rest is primarily

improvisation.

A graduate of classically-oriented Indiana University, he found his

way into bluegrass performing groups. He scorns the term "crossover"

artist. What he likes about what he calls "mix-and-match projects,"

is "to try to extend everybody and push them in places they haven’t

been." As a composer, he says, "the primary tool is to be

able to jump out of the rut that you’re in each day. Often I suspect

that the key isn’t refinement, but to stay interested and fresh."

— Elaine Strauss