Billy Peterson cut his teeth on music at a very young age. He began singing national commercial spots at age 9 with his sister, Linda Peterson, and Len Dressler of the Singers Unlimited jazz vocal group. These recordings were made at the Kay Bank studios in Minneapolis, owned and operated by award-winning recording engineer Bruce Swedien. Billy grew up in a household of professional musicians. Being interested in “any instrument he could get his hands on” Billy studied drums with Elliot Fine of the Minnesota Symphony Orchestra while in junior high school. Simultaneously, he studied the keyboard with local CBS radio employee, Ernie Garvin. Billy's father, a jazz piano player, heard Monk Montgomery on electric bass in the mid-sixties and figured this was the future of the bass. He purchased a Kay electric bass and left it in their home studio to see if any of his children would be interested in it. Billy saw it and thought, “I need to learn how to play it.”

His first musical endeavors were with his fathers' bands playing drums or electric bass in either small combos or big bands. At age 14 Billy had two life altering events happen to him. The first was when his mother, Jeanne Arland Peterson, taught him how to re-harmonize the old Irish lullaby entitled “Danny Boy” and arrange it for the ninth grade orchestra. “I was so moved on a soul level by the beautiful harmonies that my mother demonstrated that I knew I had to grasp on to just a little piece of that knowledge so I could move people like my mother moved me.” The second was when Billy's father, Willie Peterson, left his friend's upright bass underneath the piano in their home studio. “When I picked that bass up, I knew I had no choice but to make this my instrument of choice.” These early influences were the foundation for what was to follow.

In 1967, when Billy was just 16 years of age, he was asked to join a summer tour with The Righteous Brothers. This was an eye-opening experience to say the least. As he continued going to school, Billy played bass and drums in local orchestras, big bands, R&B bands and even toured with the Lawrence Welk show All Stars.

After high school Billy started playing bass with trumpet-legend Clifford Brown's pianist, Billy Wallace, for a few years until 1973. This learning experience fueled Billy's hunger for those beautiful harmonies. Wallace would manuscript his piano voicings so that Billy could study and articulate them. This harmonic knowledge would evolve and later evoke comparisons to the late Bill Evans or pianist composer, Clare Fisher, and even classical composer, Ravel.

This same year Billy co-founded the internationally acclaimed band Natural Life. Natural Life recorded 3 albums (Natural Life, Unnamed Land, and City Traffic) for the Celebration Records label and made several tours in the US from 1973-1976. The band's first album Natural Life was recorded “direct to disk” as one of the first audiophile categorized records. In 1974 one of the co-founders of Natural Life, Bob Rockwell, recorded a solo album Androids for Celebration Records. Billy was the bassist on this record, which received an outstanding 5-Star review in Downbeat Magazine.

At approximately the same time, Billy was also one of the first musicians to record on 3M's new digital tape at Sound 80 recording studios in Minneapolis. While pursuing his dream of playing jazz with an internationally recognized band, his pop career also continued to flourish. In 1974 Billy met Leo Kottke, the great folk guitarist, and was the bassist on Kottke's three albums for Capitol Records and Chrysalis: Ice Water, Dreams and All that Stuff, and Chewing Pine. Billy was also the electric and upright bassist on Bob Dylan's legendary multi-platinum recording Blood On The Tracks for Columbia Records. The single “Tangled up in Blue” topped the pop charts in 1975 and was ranked 49 on the Top 100 Rock and Roll Songs ever recorded in the December, 2000 issue of Rolling Stone magazine.

In 1976 Billy was asked to join the Gibson guitar staff. This association allowed him the opportunity to conduct clinics and perform with guitar legends BB King, Johnny Smith, Lenny Breau, Les Paul, and the late Howard Roberts. It was also during this decade when record producer and engineer David Rifkin (aka David Z, who produced Prince in the 80's) introduced Billy to keyboardist Ben Sidran (Steve Miller Band, Rolling Stones). That was the beginning of an inspiring musical partnership that has remained strong to this day.

The late seventies and early eighties were totally consumed with music from all angles. Billy released his solo album Threshold of Surrender in 1981 on Celebration Records. He continued to tour Europe with various artists and was also the in-house bassist for the Sound 80 recording studio in Minneapolis. During that time he recorded many albums plus national radio and television commercials. His performances ranged from solo bass to playing with a full symphony orchestra.

In 1986 Ben Sidran was hired to produce an album for Steve Miller on Capitol Records. Ben immediately hired Billy to play bass on the recording Born to be Blue. Steve Miller asked Billy to join the Steve Miller Band as his bassist. Billy toured with the Steve Miller Band from 1987 to 2000 during the spring and summer months and played the bass on the Born to Be Blue (Capitol), Steve Miller Band Box Set (Capitol), and Wide River (Polydor) recordings. He also continued to tour Europe and Japan in the fall and winter months with Ben Sidran.

In 1990 Ben introduced Billy to the Go Jazz record label. Billy became a Go Jazz artist, staff producer and arranger. He worked on numerous recordings with Ben Sidran, pianist and vocalist Georgie Fame, and guitarist Phil Upchurch. It was also in 1990 that Billy's old buddy, Leo Kottke, called him to service once again. This time Billy was asked to play, produce and arrange the Windham Hill recording That's What. Billy wrote a composition for this project called “Mid Air.” It turned out to be a haunting departure from the norm for Leo; however, the critics loved it and it was even considered as the theme song for a motion picture production.

Shortly after this time, The Artist formerly known as Prince asked Billy to create a string arrangement for the New Power Generation's dynamo maven, Rosie Gaines. The re-harmonization and soulful rendition of Brian Adam's hit “Everything I Do I Do It For You” is a beautiful showcase of Billy's writing style and includes a magnificent solo by alto-saxophonist David Sanborn. Additional projects that highlight Billy's outstanding production and arrangement capabilities are the Celebration Records releases The More I See You featuring jazz vocalist Patty Peterson and hard bopper Ira Sullivan and Jazz After Hours featuring jazz vocalist Linda Peterson. One of Billy's vocal arrangements for Ben Sidran on the Cool Paradise recording featured vocalist Ricky Peterson singing all the harmonies in a style that has been compared to those of the Hi-Lo's and Take 6. His original compositions, arrangements and re-harmonizations have been featured on other major record labels and throughout the Go Jazz catalogue.

Billy has been called a chameleon and at home in any “bag” of music weather it be jazz, rock, pop, R&B or country. You can catch Billy performing with various artists in different genres of music. He played with Carlos Santana and Neil Young at the 1993 Earthquake Relief in San Francisco. He played with folk-singer/songwriter Pete Seager on the Smithsonian Folkways recording Well May the World Go, which he also produced. He performs frequently with jazzers Benny Carter, Mose Allison, Dave Leibman, Dewey Redman, Lew Tabakin, Slyde Hampton, Clark Terry, and feels fortunate to have performed with the late Harry “Sweets” Edison and the late Jack MacDuff. He's recorded as a sideman on many projects with great artists such as:

• Guitarist Neal Schon of Journey on his Higher Octave recording Beyond the Thunder
• Alto-saxophonist David Sanborn on the St. Paul Atlantic Record's release Down to the Wire
• Drummer Eric Gravatt of Weather Report on Natural Life's City Traffic recording
• Drummer Vinnie Colaiuta for Sting on Ricky Peterson's Smile Blue recording
• Alto-saxophonist Phil Woods on Ben Sidran's release On the Live Side
• Keyboardist Tony Hymas for Jeff Beck on his upcoming release on Universal Europe
• Guitarist Robin Ford on Ricky Peterson's Windham Hill recording Souvenir

Billy's love for jazz encouraged him to join forces with some fellow artists and open a jazz club in his hometown. In 1996 the Artist's Quarter opened its doors in St. Paul, Minnesota. This has become Billy's new home while not on tour. “We decided to design a club that would showcase our fellow musicians in the best case scenario. It's a club designed by musicians, for musicians. The great tenor-saxophonist, Lew Tabakin, says in jest that it's the lunatics running the asylum. Maybe… but the critics and artists say it's certainly one of the premier jazz clubs in the world.”

Billy currently resides in Minneapolis with his family and has 5 children.

Updated 02-02-04.