BIOGRAPHY
Mike Rivard
Mike Rivard graduated from Berklee College of Music and also studied privately with Dave Holland. His performing/recording credits include Morphine, John Medeski & Billy Martin (MMW), Either/Orchestra, Jonatha Brooke, Aimee Mann, Shawn Colvin, Paula Cole and many others. He leads the award-winning dub-jazz-trance group Club d’Elf, recipient of the Boston Music Award in 2007 for Outstanding Jazz Act, and performs with world music groups Natraj & Grand Fatilla, as well as the Boston Pops and the Broadway tours of Wicked, Disney’s The Lion King, The Color Purple and others. He was composer and musical director for the Vadalna Tribal Dance Company’s Menagerie (2010) and Bassist in Residence at Jacob’s Pillow (2006). For the past eight years he has been immersed in Moroccan music, particularly that of the Gnawa people, and has taught himself to play the sintir, a three-stringed bass lute used in their trance ceremonies.