Johnny Hiland

Johnny Hiland
Background information
Genres Country, rock
Occupations Musician, songwriter
Instruments Guitar, banjo, mandolin, fiddle
Years active since 1996
Labels Favored Nations
Associated acts Toby Keith, Hank Williams III, Steve Vai,(The Sound Guitar Magazine)
Website johnnyhiland.net
Notable instruments
Fender Telecaster
Paul Reed Smith JH Signature

Johnny Hiland is an American musician. He began as a bluegrass player, and then went on to play jazz, blues and heavy metal.

Contents

Early life

Hiland grew up in Woodland, Maine. He was born with nystagmus, a condition of involuntary eye movement.[1]

Career

In 1996, Hiland moved to Nashville and worked as a session musician for country artists including Toby Keith, Ricky Skaggs, Janie Fricke, and Hank Williams III. Hiland signed with Steve Vai’s Favored Nations label as a solo artist. The Johnny Hiland Band has released two studio albums on the Favored Nations label.

Besides guitar, Hiland also plays banjo, fiddle and mandolin.[1]

Other activities

Hiland also works as a motivational speaker as well as a children's author. Hiland's first children's book. Tuff the Special Bear, which he wrote and illustrated, was published in 2006. In December of 2010, Hiland became partners with Jason Macedo (guitarist) as magazine partner in The Sound Guitar Magazine..[1] In, 2011 Johnny signed with Mike Varney's Shrapnel Records.

Solo discography

Equipment

Originally a dedicated Fender Telecaster player, in 1998 Hiland became the first unsigned artist to ever be awarded an endorsement deal from Fender.[2] In 2007 Paul Reed Smith and Hiland collaborated to design a Johnny Hiland Signature model guitar based on some of the technical specifications of many of Hiland's favorite session instruments.[3] He recently endorsed the "Nashville Special Elite" guitar built by Abraham Wechter of Wechter Guitars.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c Messock, Rick (17 March 2006). "Johnny Hiland Interview". Modern Guitars Magazine. http://www.modernguitars.com/archives/001717.html. Retrieved 7 January 2011. 
  2. ^ Johnny Hiland at Allmusic.com
  3. ^ Johnny Hiland Signature model at Paul Reed Smith Guitars
  4. ^ {{cite web More recently, Hiland has used Ernie Ball guitars equipped with D. Allen pickups. In 2011, Hiland worked with D. Allen to create a signature line of pickups. These included a set of three single-coil-sized blade pickups, and a set of full sized humbucking pickups. | last = | first = | authorlink = | coauthors = | title = Johnny Hiland Endorses Nashville Special Elite | work = | publisher = Wechter Guitars | date = September 2009 | url = http://www.wechterguitars.com/news/1 | format = | doi = | accessdate = 2009-10-19}}

External links