Special DVD features include: Booklet.
DVD Video, NTSC, Regions: 1
international tour with New Age keyboardist Suzanne Ciani to an avant-improv-core
club gig with guitar innovator Henry Kaiser to a folk festival with celebrated
troubadour John Gorka to a recording with the experimental post-metal trio, Attention
Deficit with Tim Alexander (Primus) and Alex Skolnick (Testament). The obvious pleasure that Michael takes in
music captivates audiences and critics alike. As writer Tom Darter put it in Keyboard
magazine after seeing one of Michael's renowned solo bass concerts, "Forget his
astounding technique and musicality; forget his absolute command of his
instruments; forget how seamlessly the musical ideas and the performance of them
were wedded together...The enlightenment came most from feeling (seeing, hearing)
the joy Michael felt to be playing...his brand of transcendental chops and musical
understanding...was all in the service of the final outcome, the joy of making music."
Building on the conceptions of his teacher, the late bass legend Jaco Pastorius,
Michael has developed an entirely new approach to the instrument that includes
unorthodox tunings, techniques and methodologies. He has honed his skills on over a
hundred recordings as a session musician and thousands of concerts throughout
the Americas, Europe and Asia. One of his most rewarding and intimate musical
collaborations was with the acoustic guitar genius Michael Hedges, who instantly
enlisted Manring's musical partnership when he first heard him play one of his
imaginative solo bass compositions while Manring was still a teenager. Hedges' tragic
death in 1997 ended a truly extraordinary musical alliance--and a very deep
friendship. Through Hedges, Manring was introduced to Windham Hill records where
he was quickly signed as house bassist and solo artist. His four solo albums with the
Windham Hill/BMG group (Unusual Weather, Toward the Center of the Night and
Drastic Measures on Windham Hill; Thonk on High Street) have earned him an
international reputation as "a master of the fretless bass without rival." (Guitar Club
Magazine, Italy). He has also garnered two gold records, Grammy and Bammie
nominations, a Berklee School of Music Distinguished Alumni Award and numerous
Bass Player Magazine Reader's Poll awards including 1994 Bassist of the Year.