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Duck Baker

Duck Baker is one of the most highly regarded fingerstyle guitarists of his generation. His repertoire ranges from traditional Irish music through old-time mountain music and bluegrass to blues, gospel, and ragtime to swing and modern jazz, to free improvisation, and while he is best known in the guitar world, he has made a reputation in several other camps, including the Celtic music world and the avant-garde scene. He explains this eclecticism by pointing out that folk musicians have always been more eclectic than folklorists want to admit, and noting that his approach to American music is similar to that of a classical musician to that tradition. Baker is also a prodigious composer, having written well over 200 pieces, mostly for guitar, and an even more prodigious arranger for the instrument. His recording career spans five decades and includes some 29 records under his own name, another 8 in duo or trio settings, and a further 32 appearances on anthologies or as a sideman. He has also authored 12 music books and a similar number of instructional videos.

Duck was born Richard R. Baker IV in 1949 and grew up in Richmond, Virginia. His teenage years were devoted to playing in rock and blues bands before becoming interested in fingerpicking blues and folk styles in local coffeehouses. Ragtime pianist Buck Evans was a major influence on Baker’s evolution, exposing the young guitarist to ragtime and early biopic03jazz at a time when the styles had largely been forgotten.

By the time he moved to San Francisco in the early seventies, Duck was performing the wide range of material heard on his first record, There’s Something for Everyone in America (Kicking Mule Records, 1976). During his San Francisco sojourn he worked regularly in a bluegrass band and also tapped into the flourishing swing/trad jazz scene. He learned to play these and other styles by working in groups, and arranged some of the repertoire learned in this manner for his solo performances. This has been Baker’s approach throughout much of his career, and it sets him apart from most fingerstyle guitarists.

Over the years, Baker has not only toured extensively in North America, Europe, Japan and Australia, but has used five different countries as a based of operations, primarily the USA, Italy, and the United Kingdom, where he now resides. Though he has to some extent curtailed his touring activities in recent years, he still finds time for some solo appearances, as well as gigging with his jazz trio/quartet and in duo with his wife, the acclaimed traditional vocalist Helen Roche.

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Radio & Podcasts

Duck, You Plucker!

Read "Duck, You Plucker!" reviewed by Patrick Burnette


It's an episode years in the making when Mike is finally able to track down guitarist, composer, and raconteur Duck Baker. We discovered Duck through his solo recording of Herbie Nichols' tunes, but Mike finds out that Duck has collaborated with such luminaries as John Zorn, Roswell Rudd, and Eugene Chadbourne while keeping up a stream of solo and group releases and composing dozens of tunes. Don't miss this discussion from one of the only finger-style guitarists as comfortable at ...

Album Review

Roswell Rudd, Duck Baker: Live

Read "Live" reviewed by Mario Calvitti


La combinazione in duo tra trombone e chitarra (particolarmente se acustica) non è mai stata molto frequente, ma d'altra parte anche Duck Baker non è proprio un chitarrista convenzionale. Partito dal fingerpicking tradizionale nella scuderia di Stefan Grossman, ha ben presto allargato il suo raggio d'azione fino a comprendere tutta la storia del jazz, dal ragtime al free d'avanguardia, soffermandosi in particolare su alcuni nomi (notevoli i suoi omaggi a Herbie Nichols e Thelonious Monk), unendo spesso le forze con ...

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Radio & Podcasts

Keep On Pluckin'

Read "Keep On Pluckin'" reviewed by Patrick Burnette


Four six-string masters going solo are the focus for this fortnight's podcast, and they cover the gamut from acoustic true-believers to studio mavens ready to mix it up with multi-tracking and effects pedals. What are the benefits—and dangers—of attempting jazz without compadres? Wouldn't you know it, Pat & Mike have opinions on that topic. Pop matters focuses squarely on the King -at least for white people of a certain age -Elvis Presley. Playlist Discussion of Leo Kottke's album ...

Multiple Reviews

Duck Baker, un chitarrista tra passato e presente

Read "Duck Baker, un chitarrista tra passato e presente" reviewed by Mario Calvitti


Duck Baker è un chitarrista abbastanza difficile da inquadrare; mentre la tecnica che usa è rigorosamente fingerstyle, la musica che compone e interpreta spazia lungo tutta la storia del jazz, dai vecchi standard al modale, dal blues al bebop, dallo swing al free. I suoi interessi si estendono inoltre a tutta la American Music, che interpreta e analizza con il rigore di un musicologo. Il tutto utilizzando quasi esclusivamente una chitarra da flamenco, con le corde di nylon anziché di ...

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Multiple Reviews

Duck Baker: Everything That Rises Must Converge; The Waltz Lesson; The Ducks Palace

Read "Duck Baker: Everything That Rises Must Converge; The Waltz Lesson; The Ducks Palace" reviewed by Clifford Allen


Duck Baker Everything That Rises Must Converge Mighty Quinn 2009 Duck Baker The Waltz Lesson Les Cousins 2009 Duck Baker The Ducks Palace Incus Records 2009 Though acoustic guitarist, composer and musicologist Duck Baker has long been on the periphery of jazz and improvised music--playing in ...

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Album Review

Duck Baker: Everything That Rises Must Converge

Read "Everything That Rises Must Converge" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay


Richard “Duck" Baker's four decade career as a guitarist has encompassed folk, ragtime, blues, jazz, and avant-garde improvisation. Everything That Rises Must Converge is firmly located within the latter genre--indeed, it's sub-titled “Free Jazz Guitar Solos"--but much of the music on this enjoyable record could only have been made by an artist with a firm grasp of the more “traditional" approaches to playing the guitar. The album is the result of two recording sessions--eight pieces from a ...

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Profile

Duck Baker: Spinning Song

Read "Duck Baker: Spinning Song" reviewed by Laurel Gross


If you have to ask who Duck Baker is, don't beat yourself up. Not a fixture on the New York scene, this accomplished acoustic finger-picking guitarist, composer and improviser--who has devoted himself to free music, modern jazz, swing, blues, gospel, Appalachian fiddling, Irish and Scottish folk song and other influences that were absorbed within these borders--isn't known to everybody. Perhaps that's because all of his seemingly far-flung interests have made him difficult to classify or even identify. But that can ...

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Recording

Duck Baker On Thelonious Monk

Duck Baker On Thelonious Monk

Source: Rifftides by Doug Ramsey

Duck Baker Plays Monk (Triple Point Records) Duck Baker (Richard Royal Baker IV) may not be a household name among jazz devotees at large, but in his career of more than four decades he has become a hero to other guitarists. He has led or been involved in dozens of recordings of folk music from all over the world, and several varieties of ragtime, gospel, bluegrass and blues. Baker is an exemplary performer and teacher of what is often called ...

“Duck Baker is a true genius of the guitar.” – Stefan Grossman

Duck has discovered a way to write which is purely and originally beautiful. I think he sets a standard we all can aspire to.” – Leo Kottke

“Listening to Duck Baker makes me feel good.” – Charlie Byrd

“One of the most interesting pickers around” – Chet Atkins

“Quite simply, Duck Baker is the premier American fingerstyle guitarist.” – Sing Out

“He can go from the Mississippi Delta to the rings of Saturn” – The Village Voice

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Live

Dot Time Records
2021

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Duck Baker Plays Monk

Triple Point Records
2017

buy

Amnesia in Trastevere

Ripa Records
2012

buy

The Ducks Palace

Mt. Non Fiction Records
2009

buy

The Roots & Branches...

Mt. Non Fiction Records
2009

buy

Everything That Rises...

Mighty Quinn Productions
2009

buy

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