Steve Burgh

• Born: December 17, 1950, Trenton, NJ
• Died: February 07, 2005, Kingston, NY
• Active: '60s, '70s, '80s, '90s, 2000s
• Genres: Rock
• Instrument: Guitar

Biography

Producer and session guitarist Steve Burgh was born December 17, 1950, in Trenton, NJ. He began playing Greenwich Village rock and folk clubs while still in his mid-teens, once jamming with no less than Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Winter, and Buddy Miles, and was barely out of high school when his band Jacob's Creek signed to Columbia to release its self-titled 1969 debut LP. The group split soon after, and Burgh next surfaced in 1971 playing bass on David Bromberg's own eponymous debut, beginning a session career that would quickly grow to include dates in support of John Prine, Steve Goodman, and Willie Nelson (1973's classic Shotgun Willie). Burgh spent much of the mid-'70s serving as musical director for Phoebe Snow, and in 1977 he contributed guitar to Billy Joel's breakthrough effort The Stranger, appearing on the Grammy-winning "Just the Way You Are." In 1982 Burgh founded his own Lower Manhattan recording studio, Baby Monster, which in the decade to follow was the site of sessions headlined by artists as varied as the Ramones, Emmylou Harris, John Cage, and Cypress Hill, among numerous others. Despite relocating to Accord, NY, in 1995, Burgh continued producing records by local acts including the Five Points Band and the Kansas City Sound Band. In the summer of 2004, he moved to nearby Kingston, opening a nightclub/studio dubbed 33. He died of a massive heart attack on February 7, 2005, at the age of just 54. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide