Home: About Jim Bugg

Who best to tell you about Jim Bugg than Jim Bugg himself? How does one even begin to talk about themselves without sounding too proud or self-absorbed? I will tell you a few things about myself and then let you decide.

Having started piano at a young age (which I recommend all kids do), something inside of me felt that there was some potential to this music thing. After taking piano for a few years, I started the saxophone at age 11. I'd seen the high school band play and told my mom that I wanted to play that gold thing that looked like a giant pipe. I even remember the song the band was playing all those years ago - a lovely number by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass.

I took to the saxophone like stink on a skunk and won a few awards through my school "career". My band teacher, Derry Addison, sensed that he had a student that really enjoyed the horn and spent a little extra time with me. He turned me onto horn players like Boots Randolph and Skywalk with Tom Keenlyside and I got my first "record" of Boots when I was around 16. I was hooked. I played in the Jazz Band and Concert Bands and loved every minute of it. Grade 12 came along and I took the Guitar class. It wasn't too long into the course that I found guitar playing came pretty easy to me and then was told to play drums for the guitar class. It just went from there and it became a mission of mine to learn to play every instrument in the entire world before I died. Still working on it...

In Grade 12, I applied for the Provincial Honour Band at the prompting of my band teacher. I recorded my tape and sent it in to be adjudicated. I received a letter a few short months later thanking me for applying and that they were sorry I didn't make the cut. Fast forward to my first saxophone lesson in university. I was getting to know my sax teacher and she asked me about any playing I'd done. I told her about how I tried out for the Provincial Honour Band and didn't make it. She looks at me and asks "What was your name again?" I told her my name and she asked why I didn't go - sounding a little confused. I again told her I'd received a letter telling me I didn't make it. She then proceeded to tell me that I had made the cut with flying colours, there wasn't even a close second sax player and that she was the one who'd adjudicated my tape. She then surmised that I'd been sent the letter because they didn't want some geeky little horn player from way up in Northern BC (Mackenzie) showing up all of their big time band programs in the Lower Mainland. Well, I felt pretty good about that. A little ticked off, but pretty good.

I graduated, went to university (Trinity Western University in Langley, BC) which is where my music really started to flourish and take over a major part of my life. I played in all sorts of bands and groups - some of these people are even famous today. One such wonderful person was Carolyn Arends and I suggest you check out her music. I took a break from school after my 3rd year, became an in demand session player, played on many albums and gigs (always hated that word) and spent countless hours in various bands. I recorded a somewhat amateurish album in 1994. It was not quite what I wanted and, thusly, didn't promote it all that much. It was a hard lesson learned in not letting others take control of ones vision for their own music. I taught many lessons (sax, flute, clarinet, drums, piano, guitar....) and also many classes in schools. Nothing, however, beats playing live with the immediate response of an appreciative audience. I've been on many radio shows, TV shows and blah, blah, blah...

A few of the bands I played in were Jonny and the Stickmen and I started my own Funk-Fusion-Jazz band called Jim Bugg & The Maze. We were pretty good and were about to go places when not everyone in the band turned out to be on the same page and we dissolved. Too bad... we were pretty good. You can hear a few samples of us in the Audio Vault on the front page. "Freedom" is one song we played which I wrote that Campus Crusade for Christ used for the launch of Power to Change. If you watched the video, you heard the song. Lead vocals are by Leon Leontaridis of the pop-opera group Destino. They have album coming out in the new year. Leon is cool. He can sing really high. Sometimes he sounds like a girl he sings so high.

Well, enough about me. There is so much more I could say, but I don't want to bore you to tears. All this is to say that it's been a loong journey to where I am today and I'm thankful to God everyday for the gifts and abilities he's blessed me with. Some people are great with wood, others with numbers... I just happen to know music.

Oh yeah. I like to act, too. I also have a beautiful family - Anita (my wife), Riley and Markus. They're all pretty cool. You may visit our family site by clicking here - www.bugg.ca

I'd be happy to hear from you sometime if you'd like to drop me an email. Click here and drop me a line.

Blessings,

Jim Bugg

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