History
Tibbetts was born in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1954. His first two records were created when he was in college. The second, Yr although self-released (and eventually rereleased by ECM Records), gained a degree of notice, especially from fans of the electric guitar. That record featured many overdubs, on one track as many as 50 overdubs creating a unique soundscape.
The first record Tibbetts created for a major label was Northern Song, for ECM Records in 1982. This was an attempt to fit Tibbetts music into Manfred Eicher's style of very rapid recording. Usually ECM albums are recorded in just two to three days. However, Northern Song received scathing reviews. Perhaps as a result, Tibbetts went back to his previous method of recording very slowly over a period of months (or longer). His subsequent records gained better reviews and, somewhat unusually for ECM Records, were among the only not produced by Manfred Eicher.
He released five albums in the 1980s, three in the 1990s, and, as of this writing, two in the 2000s. He has also collaborated with other artists including Norwegian hardingfele player Knut Hamre and Tibetan Buddhist nun Chöying Drolma. His longtime collaborator, percussionist Marc Anderson, has appeared on all the recordings in the discography except the inaugural 1977 Steve Tibbetts album.
Tibbetts stopped doing live performances regularly in the mid-1980s. Steve Tibbetts and Marc Anderson have toured on other occasions including a 1988 "YR" tour, a 1991/1992 "Big Map Idea" tour and shows with Chöying Drolma in 1997, 1999, and 2005. Starting in the late 1980s he travelled extensively in Nepal, which is where he met Chöying Drolma, a Tibetan Buddhist nun. Their first collaboration, Chö, was not intended as a commercial record but it was released and gained some positive notice. The second project, Selwa, was a far more carefully considered musical collaboration and it received some very positive reviews as an example of a successful meeting of two very different musical traditions. These releases helped establish what would become Chöying Drolma's Nepalese chart topping music career.
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