John Reischman is one of the world’s best acoustic mandolin players and composers. He plays with the bluegrass band, John Reischman and the Jaybirds. He also plays Latin/jazz. The Jaybirds have released four albums: Stellar Jays, The Road West, Field Guide, and their debut album John Reischman and the Jaybirds. John released instrumental bluegrass albums with guitarist John Miller: Up in the Woods in 1999 and Bumpy Road in 2002.

John was born in Ukiah, California in 1955. He first played guitar at age 12, and discovered the mandolin at 17. Drawing inspiration from the playing of bluegrass patriarch Bill Monroe and new acoustic mandolin pioneers Frank Wakefield, Sam Bush, Andy Statman and David Grisman, John was also influenced by his exposure to the hot swing of guitarist Django Reinhardt and jazz mandolin of pioneers Jethro Burns and Tiny Moore.

He performed in the San Francisco Bay Area in the late 1970s with the Tony Rice Unit and the Good Ol’ Persons before moving to Vancouver, British Columbia in the early 1990s to pursue a solo career.
Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.