ABOUT
"Tim Watson is the future". - Tom Lippincott
Tim Watson, 23, is a guitarist, producer, and composer based in Miami, Florida. He has experience working professionally in a broad range of musical styes, including modern jazz, Carnatic fusion, Cuban jazz, Mugham fusion, new music, and indie pop.
His professional career began in earnest when he began performing regularly in Miami with Cuban jazz legend Ignacio Berroa (described by Dizzy Gillespie as "the only Latin drummer in the world in the history of American music that intimately knows both worlds: his native Afro-Cuban music as well as Jazz") and multi-Grammy winning bassist Armando Gola, a group dubbed the BGW trio. Since then, he has become known as one of the busiest and most versatile guitarists in South Florida.
He has extensive experience performing and or recording with modern jazz luminaries like Noah Preminger, David Leon, Armando Gola, Alison Miller, Sasha Berliner, Tony Scherr, Jason Palmer, and Brian Lynch, among others. A avid student of Carnatic rhythm, Watson recently performed with heavyweight South Indian classical artists Anantha R. Krishnan, Shree Sundarkumar, and Charumathi Raghuraman in Chennai, India on New Years Eve to close out the Madras music season.
His project Tim Watson's Hostile Architecture, a sextet inspired by South Indian classical rhythm, American minimalism, and 21st century electro-acoustic music just released their first single Adrenochrome Etude. Other current projects include 12eyes, JUNE ARC, The McModern, and Cost of Living. He also is a member of Juvenoia, a NYC based fusion group led by Miguel Russell and Vittorio Stropoli. He recently collaborated with Dion Kerr on an ambient EP called Jems as well as his Dialogues series. Current composition activities include the large scale theatrical work Blackpill 2023 and a new string quartet for JACK Quartet.
Watson has performed abroad in Germany, Canada, Suriname, Italy, and Costa Rica, and at many of the US's premier jazz venues, including the Blue Whale (LA), Nublu (NYC), the Black Cat (SF), Dizzy's at Jazz at Lincoln Center (NYC), Drom (NYC), Elsewhere (NYC), the Sultan Room (NYC), Rockwood Music Hall Stage 2 (NYC), and the North Beach Bandshell (Miami). His future pop ensemble JUNE ARC recently performed at III Points festival in Miami. His guitar playing can be heard on 31 commercially released tracks.
Watson has studied improvisation with John Hart, Ben Monder, Kris Davis, Brian Lynch, Tony Malaby, and Martin Bejerano. He has studied composition with Oren Boneh, Tania Leon (winner of the 2021 Pulitzer prize in music), Dorothy Hindman, and Juraj Kojs. He has also studied South Indian rhythm and Konnakol with Anantha R. Krishnan, and Cuban rhythmic independence with Dafnis Prieto (MacArthur Fellow and Grammy award winner). He is also heavily influenced by his experience working with Miami drummers like Dave Chiverton, Harvel Nakundi, Ludwig Afonso, and Ignacio Berroa. Watson has been informally studying sound design since age 12, and specializes in the VST Serum.
He has a BA in Studio Music and Jazz from University of Miami's Frost School of Music, where he was a Stamps Distinguished Ensemble Scholar. Watson is currently a graduate teaching assistant and Henry Mancini Fellow in the jazz department at the Frost School of Music and completing a masters degree in composition.
Watson has taught students all over the world, leading clinics with the Stamps Quintet at Berkeley High School, Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA), the Conservatorio de Musica Pescara in Italy, in Suriname, South America, and with the Beantown Swing Orchestra, where he is a regular big band instructor.
He is fluent in Ableton Live, Logic Pro, Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, and Premiere. He also works in graphic design and typography.