1. Woody Jackson moved to Los Angeles in 1992, and eventually joined the band Friends of Dean Martinez.
39 Facts About Woody Jackson
1. 2.
Woody Jackson later became a session musician, working on the soundtracks of films like Ocean's Twelve and The Devil Wears Prada.
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Woody Jackson began working with Rockstar Games in 2008, joining Bill Elm to co-compose the music of Red Dead Redemption, partly inspired by Ennio Morricone's work on the Dollars Trilogy.
4.
Woody Jackson continued working with Rockstar for the music of Red Dead Redemption 2, composing roughly 60 hours of music over five years.
5.
Woody Jackson was often inspired by artists such as Tom Waits while growing up.
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Woody Jackson attended William Penn High School, at which he was an honors student in his final year in 1988, and studied at Virginia State University for one year, where he took harmonica lessons, before transferring to study under Ellis Marsalis Jr.
7.
Woody Jackson eventually dropped out when his funds were depleted, and turned to playing guitar with the blues band the Useless Playboys, often performing as the opening act for the Reverend Horton Heat.
8.
Woody Jackson performed for one day as part of the United States Navy Band.
9.
In 1992, shortly after the 1992 Los Angeles riots, Woody Jackson moved from Richmond to Los Angeles.
10.
Woody Jackson performed in the group Hotel X, which released its album Engendered Species with SST Records in 1994; he toured with the Useless Playboys around this time, alongside Mike Geier.
11.
In 1995, Woody Jackson collaborated with musician Bill Elm, who introduced him to the band Friends of Dean Martinez.
12.
Woody Jackson eventually acted as a fill-in for an absent guitar player before remaining with the band as a full member for some time.
13.
Woody Jackson worked for McCabe's Guitar Shop for several years, where he learned how to play chromatic harmonica in one lesson from Dave Gage.
14.
Woody Jackson co-composed the scores for the films Men Cry Bullets with Ivan Knight and Forest Dunn, and The Last Man with Knight, and contributed music to the soundtracks for The Invisible Circus, Bewitched, Fast Food Nation with Elm as part of Friends of Dean Martinez, and Youth in Revolt with Petra Haden.
15.
Woody Jackson appears in the documentary film Moog, performing alongside Money Mark.
16.
Woody Jackson spent around six years "searching for a new sound that no one ever had heard"; he crafted his own guitorgan by connecting a Chamberlin keyboard to a guitar, an instrument he later used on films such as Ocean's Twelve and Ocean's Thirteen.
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Around 2009, Woody Jackson took over Melrose Avenue-based Electro-Vox Recording Studios, which was established in 1931 and is said to be the oldest privately-held recording studio in the United States.
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Woody Jackson is an avid collector of vintage instruments and recording equipment for the studio.
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Around 2010, Woody Jackson was working on instrument restoration with the family of Harry Chamberlin, inventor of the Chamberlin keyboard.
20.
Woody Jackson is featured in Melodrama: The Mellotron Movie, a documentary directed by Dianna Dilworth about the Chamberlin.
21.
When researching music for inspiration, Woody Jackson found there was no contemporaneous "Western sound"; he felt the soundtracks of 1960s Western films, such as Ennio Morricone's work on the Dollars Trilogy, was more representative of Western music.
22.
Shortly after finding a German guitar in Los Angeles with the appropriate sound and "a perfect tremolo", Woody Jackson returned home and wrote the game's main theme.
23.
Woody Jackson collaborated with Tommy Morgan, whom he had met while working on Ocean's Thirteen, on the soundtrack's harmonica tracks.
24.
Woody Jackson provided the reassembled music to Elm before going on tour with Vincent Gallo; when he returned from tour, the score was finalized.
25.
Noire, Woody Jackson re-orchestrated one of the themes and wrote much of the in-game music.
26.
Proceeds from the album went to the Japanese Red Cross Society following the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami; Woody Jackson had recently spent some time in the country, where he met the album's producer Akira Yamaoka.
27.
Woody Jackson composed the music for The Real Rocky, a television film broadcast as part of the series 30 for 30.
28.
In 2012, Woody Jackson provided songs for Good Vibrations and ModNation Racers: Road Trip and additional music for the first season of Nashville with T Bone Burnett.
29.
Woody Jackson released an original album, Dos Manos, in Italy in July 2012, produced by Holmes and published by Interbang Records and Brutture Moderne.
30.
Woody Jackson later worked in a team of producers for the music of Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto V, collaborating with the Alchemist, Oh No, and Tangerine Dream.
31.
Froese and Woody Jackson then sent their work between The Alchemist and Oh No, who heavily sampled it.
32.
Alongside The Alchemist, Oh No, and Tangerine Dream, Woody Jackson co-presented a 70-minute live concert featuring the game's original score at the New York Film Festival in September 2013.
33.
Woody Jackson composed roughly 60 hours of music for the game over five years, though several were cut; the game has 192 interactive mission tracks.
34.
Woody Jackson acquired a 1920s Gibson Mandobass used on Bullitt that recreated an "ominous" bell sound, ukuleles from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and a nylon guitar used on Unforgiven.
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Woody Jackson gathered musician friends like Haden, bassist Mike Watt, and drummer Jon Theodore for jam sessions, often using Woody Jackson's old instruments.
36.
Woody Jackson led an hour-long live performance of the soundtrack at the Red Bull Music Festival in Los Angeles in February 2019.
37.
In June 2020, Woody Jackson released his first original solo album, Tres Flores, alongside a digital re-release of Dos Manos.
38.
In 2010, Woody Jackson married Sharon Sheinwold, a talent manager for Ocean Avenue Entertainment, who formerly worked as a talent agent and partner for United Talent Agency from 1992 to 2008, and for William Morris Endeavor from 2008 to 2021.
39.
Woody Jackson has a son named Zach, who performed the French horn on Cowboy Yoga, and two daughters, who were credited for musical contributions to Red Dead Redemption, Grand Theft Auto V, and Red Dead Redemption 2.