When Michael Hedges titles one of his compositions “Bensusan”, you know the inspiration behind must be special and Pierre Bensusan certainly is. Guitarists from Leo Kottke to Larry Corryel, from Tuck Andres to Tommy Emanuel, to Mark Knopfler have sung his praises, and Steve Vai released three Bensusan albums on his label Favored Nations. Voted by Guitar Player magazine readers as Best World Music Guitarist, Bensusan’s music is contemplative, wistful, sublime and prodigiously performed with inspiration rooted in nature. Bensusan is a storyteller, using expressive and lyrical acoustic guitar parlance and ethereal vocalization or French lyrics to allure, transfix and transport. Primarily instrumental music in which the guitar is conceived as an orchestra.
Born in Algeria, growing up in Paris, Bensusan has taught himself to play guitar after four years of piano training, inked his first record deal when he was 17, winning the Rose d’Or at the Montreux Festival for his 1975 debut album, “Près de Paris.” More recently, he won an Independent Music Award in 2014 for “Encore”, a triple live record. He’s regarded as one of the greatest acoustic guitar players of the 21stcentury, known for his immense sound vocabulary utilizing hues of world music, new age, jazz, classical, traditional, folk and pop with French, Arabic, Latin and Celtic cultural references. They represent Pierre’s genuine vocabulary and the best part of our world in its current state, a world sharing itself.
