Rob Reich Guitarist

I've been playing music since the beginning. My Mom tells me I used to drum myself into an ecstatic trance on her kitchen floor with the available pots and pans.Stayed with the drums until about age 12 when the guitar Gods descended upon me and bestowed their indelible imprint on my musical psyche forever !!! :-) The aforementioned guitarists being Jimi Hendrix, Ritchie Blackmore, Jimmy Page, Eddie Van Halen, Allan Holdsworth, Scott Henderson, John McLaughlin,Jeff Beck,Wes Montgomery, Pat Metheny,Jerry Garcia and on and on and on. I absorbed all their magic through my school years and into my first band Onyx. We performed at many clubs in the NYC area at the tender ages of 15-18 playing original songs mixed with some covers. Around this time I also started doing many studio sessions,developing my versatility and being exposed to a wide variety of styles of music. From there I attended the Jazz Studies Program at William Paterson University in NJ. At this highly acclaimed school I had the great fortune of studying and/or playing with such jazz luminaries as Rufus Reid, Harold Mabern, Joe Lovano, Joe Henderson, Cedar Walton, Steve Turre and many others. I graduated with honors and the jazz studies award. An incredible experience indeed. Since college, I have performed and recorded in just about every conceivable style barring country and western.(not that there's anything wrong with a little C&W :-) I've backed up singer/songwriters like Paul Ruderman and Merideth LeVande on Manhattan's lower east side. I've performed with legendary R-n-B artists like Freddie Jackson, Ashford and Simpson and Stephanie Mills as part of the house band at The sugar Bar in NYC. I've played many great jazz gigs over the years with such talented musicians as drummer Aaron Comess(of the Spin Doctors),saxophonist Tony Malaby, trumpeter Todd Horton, guitarist Vic Juris and many others. A great gig came along in 2006 when I was invited to do some dates with the young,talented pianist/vocalist Peter Cincotti. We played some great venues like the London Jazz Festival,The Sundance Film Festival,the Tony Danza show and the Walt Disney arts center in California. Another incredible experience. Also in 2006 I played in a band that provided music for "Shining Star", a dance piece choreographed by David Parsons for the Alvin Ailey American dance theater which featured the music of Earth,Wind and Fire. It was a blast to accompany such an amazing dance company with some of the members of EWF sitting in the audience !!! Most recently I've been finishing up my original debut release "Wake Up", samples of which are on this page.