Gregg Bissonette


Gregg Bissonette is an American drummer. He has been a touring, session recording, and full-time drummer in many jazz and rock bands. He is primarily known being part of the David Lee Roth band, and for his instructional videos and drum clinics. He is the brother of bass player Matt Bissonette, who for a short while joined Gregg in Roth's band.

Career

One of Bissonette's first recordings was Brandon Field's The Other Side of the Story in 1985. It featured David Garfield on keyboards. A few years later Bissonette would start playing shows with Field, Garfield and Steve Lukather on guitar and with John Peña on bass as Los Lobotomys. These shows took place at the Baked Potato, a jazz club and restaurant in Los Angeles, California, playing rock, Latin, and jazz.
Bissonnette got his big break joining former Van Halen frontman David Lee Roth. The band included guitarist Steve Vai and future Mr. Big bassist Billy Sheehan. During 1985-1992 Gregg appeared on all three US Billboard 200 hit albums Eat 'Em and Smile Skyscraper and A Little Ain't Enough and the subsequent world tours.
In 1990 and 1993, Bissonette released drum videos Private Lesson and Playing, Reading & Soloing with a Band, respectively. Private Lesson covers a variety of topics including double bass drumming, rudiments, playing with a metronome and brushes.
From 1994 to 2004, he played on the musical interludes for every episode for the TV show Friends.
In late 1995, Toto was beginning their Tambu tour when Simon Phillips developed back problems. Phillips asked Bissonette to fill in for him during the tour's first leg.
He played drums on Santana's album Supernatural. In 2007, he recorded on the album La La Land by Daniel Glen Timms.
In 2001 he was set to play on the Electric Light Orchestra's Zoom Tour Live with his brother Matt on Bass. The tour was cancelled after one televised performance at the CBS Television City on PBS
Bissonette can be heard on a number of rock instrumental and progressive rock albums, including The Extremist by Joe Satriani, Temporal by Shadrane, Deep Forest by Deep Forest, Bass Invader by Martin Motnik, Inner Galactic Fusion Experience by Richie Kotzen, Shadow King by Steve Fister, Revolution Road by Rocket Scientists, In the Eye of Time by Vox Tempus, Bug Alley and the soundtrack to the movie The Endless Summer II by Gary Hoey.
In 2012, Bissonette played drums on several tracks featured on Docker's Guild's album The Mystic Technocracy: Season 1: The Age Of Ignorance, the progressive rock space opera masterminded by the French-American musician, teacher, and ethno-musicologist Douglas R. Docker.

Discography

Television soundtracks

Gregg Bissonette's movie soundtrack credits include the following: