Eric Swiontkowski

I am an electric and upright bass player from New Jersey. I have been playing bass in bands of many different genres for over 11 years. A few of my previous bands include Newbru, Yardsdale, Rutgers Jazz Ensemble, and 6 years with my first band Headless Rush (later renamed "The Slice"). This past May I graduated with a music degree in jazz performance from Mason Gross School of the Arts. I studied jazz music with some incredible teachers including trombonist Conrad Herwig, guitarist Vic Juris, drummer Victor Lewis, and piano professor Stanley Cowell. Most importantly my bass professor Mike Richmond taught me how to play the Acoustic Upright Bass and really get serious about playing bass professionally for the rest of my life. Now, 20 straight years of school is enough for me and I just want to get out and play for people as much as possible.I also play in the cover band "the Joint Effort" that is available for weddings and parties as well as my jazz group that can bring the sweet sounds of jazz to any occasion. I teach both electric and double bass privately. If you would like to contact me for lessons, I will be sure to make time to teach you. In addition to the bass I play a Gibson Les Paul Guitar and currently teach guitar and bass at a music school in New Jersey. My very first attempt at music was playing drums in the school concert band 14 years ago and you can still catch me sitting in as a part time drummer at jam sessions.I now play a Modulus Quantum 6-string bass (pictures coming soon). I am very excited about this bass because I have never owned 6-string bass or an electric bass as nice as this one. It has a semi-hollow body with an F hole on the top. The bass comes with Bartolini pickups and an aguilar preamp. It has the signiture Moduls graphite neck with a satin finish on the back. To top it off, the bass has a quitled maple black stone finish. I bought this bass to replace my 5-string Fender Jazz Bass that was stolen from me in New York City (see blog).Here are a few videos of me playing bass with the Newbru. For more videos, go to youtube.com and search "Newbru". Enjoy.This is a live video of Newbru performing "Elizabeth" at Maxwell's in Hoboken, NJ from November 2007.In April Newbru played the late night set at Rutgers' Tent State. Here is a video of "In Dreams" with Fire Dancers. If you like it, rate it on Google Video.This is my audition video for the youtube.com contest to play with the Foo Fighters at the Grammy Awards. It is a section from "The Pretender" with my own solo. Also check out my youtube.com channel: www.youtube.com/eswiontHere's a video of when I played with the Killer Marimbist Simon Boyar, Eric Lindberg and Cliff Ramsey at the Knitting Factory in New York City. This is Simon's solo from "when sick me nasty."