Michael Hedges

Michael Alden Hedges (December 31, 1953 – December 2, 1997) was an American acoustic guitarist and songwriter. He was known as a virtuoso who used unorthodox playing techniques, and much of his output was classified as new age music. Hedges died in an auto accident, and won a posthumous Grammy Award for his album Oracle.

Early years The son of Thayne Alden Hedges and Ruth Evelyn Hedges Ipsen, Michael Hedges was born in Sacramento, California. His life in music began in Enid, Oklahoma, playing flute and guitar. He enrolled at Phillips University in Enid to study classical guitar and composition under E. J. Ulrich, who Hedges credited as his biggest influence from his academic training. Hedges studied as a composition major at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Maryland

Hedges made a living by playing and singing in bars and restaurants in Baltimore while a student at Peabody. From 1976 to 1977 he played electric guitar and flute for a local group called Lotus Band, which he left to start performing as a solo acoustic act. In 1980, he made plans to move to California to study music at Stanford University.

Death According to his manager Hilleary Burgess, Hedges was driving home from San Francisco International Airport after a visit to a girlfriend in Long Island, New York. His car apparently skidded off a rain-slicked S-curve and down a cliff. Hedges was thrown from his car and appeared to have died nearly instantly. His body was found a few days afterward. After his death, his album Oracle won the 1997 Grammy Award for Best New Age Album.

Hedges' unfinished last recordings were completed for the album Torched with the help of Burgess and friends David Crosby and Graham Nash, who also provided backing vocals on one track.

Guitars Hedges regularly used the following instruments: 1971 Martin D-28 guitar (nicknamed "Barbara") with a combination of a Sunrise S-1 magnetic pickup and FRAP contact pickup under the treble strings A 1978 Ken DuBourg custom made steel string guitar (stolen and returned many years later) A custom 1980s Takamine guitar with his name on the headstock Lowden L-25 guitars Martin J-65M guitars 1920s Dyer harp guitar configured with a FRAP/autoharp pickup combo / reconfigured with Sunrise S-1 and two Barcus Berry magnetic pickups for the sub-basses (glued straight to the body) Steve Klein electric harp guitar with a Steinberger TransTrem bridge circa 1913 black Knutsen harp guitar (often incorrectly referred to as a Dyer) with a FRAP/autoharp pickup combo—and rattlesnake tail wedged under the sub-basses at the headstock Custom Ervin Somogyi acoustic (as credited on Breakfast in the Field)

Discography Michael Hedges Blvd., on the Northern Oklahoma College (former Phillips University) campus in Enid, Oklahoma. Breakfast in the Field (Windham Hill, 1981) Aerial Boundaries (Windham Hill, 1984) Watching My Life Go By (Open Air, 1985) Santabear's First Christmas (1986) Live on the Double Planet (Windham Hill, 1987) Strings of Steel (1988) Taproot (Windham Hill, 1990) Princess Scargo and the Birthday Pumpkin (1993) The Road to Return (High Street, 1994) Oracle (Windham Hill, 1996) Torched (Windham Hill, 1999)