NIKOS BRISCO, BIOGRAPHY

Nikos Brisco has been living in the borough of Astoria, Queens just outside of New York City for the past four years. He has been performing and recording professionally as a singer/songwriter since 1989 when he formed the post modern country band Fever In The Funkhouse (voted "Best New Act 90" and "Best Act Overall 91" by The Dallas Observer). For four years Fever was one of the defining pioneers of the Deep Ellum Music scene. Originally born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Brisco at an early age picked up the thread of working class style of song and story that is exclusive to true Texas folk music. His style is to the point and poetic, using an acoustic guitar as landscape for stories of love found, lost and torn, songs of simple things and real moments turned mythological in the scheme of a life lived hard with nothing in hand and everything to lose.

Following in the footsteps of Texas troubadours such as Steve Earle, Guy Clark and Kris Kristofferson it was no surprise that Brisco found a place opening for such Texas songwriting legends as Townes Van Zandt and Jimmie Dale Gilmore. Brisco has also shown a diverse side to his music by incorporating exotic world folk styles and instruments with the traditional Western song style he has grown up with. As well as acoustic guitar Brisco also plays Greek bouzouki, tzouras and baglama, Turkish oud, mandolina, Russian balalaika, dumbek and frame drum. He has used the diversity of his musical styles as motivation to create different ensembles Plato's Kave, Pluto's Winter Review, and his latest Country and Eastern Ensemble and The Hellblazer Ensemble. In 93 Brisco recorded his first solo work Pluto with Gypsy/Jazz band Café Noir, the album an eclectic work of original compositions mixing rock, jazz and classical, it was here that Brisco first started experimenting with the bouzouki and themes of his Greek heritage.

As a singer/songwriter Brisco has performed all over the country from East Coast to West and most recently he performed in Moscow, Russia at B2 Club Cool Train. In March of 2004 Brisco will mount his first tour of the U.K. He has performed extensively in New York City, The Living Room, Side Walk Café (N.Y.C.'s premier underground songwriting venues); other New York venues include Tupelo, Hanks Saloon, Orange Bear, CB's Gallery, Here Arts Center and Tribeca Blues. Also on the East Coast, AS220 Providence, R.I., The Fire Philadelphia, Pa., and was featured in Boston, Mass. as part of Hellcountry.Com. Brisco has performed at the prestigious Mc Cabe's Guitar Store in Santa Monica, California, Caravan Of Dreams, Ft.Worth, Texas, Stubs, Austin, Texas, Anderson Fair, Houston, Texas, Poor David's Pub, Gypsy Tea Room, Club DaDa, Trees, Club Clearview, Deep Ellum Live, Dallas, Texas.

In 2002 Brisco returned to Austin, Texas to record Greek/Texan with producers Kevin Johnson and Nicholas Dotin (Panic Choir, The Wild Blooms). The album draws on his roots as a folk songwriter, touching the classic Texas vision of lyric and grit with a Mediterranean blue grass feel and the traditional Americana sound and spirit. Greek/Texan was voted "Album Of The Month September 2002" by Ray Pieters Radio Milo (Belgium) and has received regional radio airplay on the East Coast Alt-Country scene.

In 2000 when Brisco moved to New York City he immediately found work off- Broadway composing songs and score for musical theatre. In Dallas he worked with the Undermain Theatre as a composer and actor and his band Plato's Kave performed at the Kalita Humphreys Theater as part of the Dallas Theater Center's Festival of the Unexpected. In New York Brisco composed songs and score for Ruth Margraff's Texas Musical Brawl Centaur Battle of San Jacinto (an extended barroom brawl) at Dixon Place/Vineyard Theater. His theatre compositions have also been featured in New York City at Fordham University at Lincoln Center, Here Arts Center's American Living Room and Culturemart, New Dramatist Playtime Series, The Ohio Theatre, 45 Bleeker Theatre and Gale Gates.

Brisco's latest work is the folk operetta JUDGES 19: Black Lung Exhaling created with Ruth Margraff, internationally known avant-garde playwright and playwriting professor at the Yale School of Drama. Brisco's mastery of composition in the American & Texas folk idiom combined with Margraff's poetic lyric has put them at the forefront of the new opera movement. In 2000 they premiered JUDGES 19: to eager audiences and rave reviews at The Fronterafest Long Fringe in Austin, Texas. The operetta's success in Austin led to a successful run at The Undermain Theatre in Dallas, TX. The International premier of Judges 19 was at the 2001 Sazvezde Belef Constellation in Belgrade, Serbia with the support of an ITI/TCG Travel Grant and later that year it was performed at Here Arts Center in New York City as part of the HARP/Opera Project. In 2002 Judges 19 was presented at Perishable Theater in Providence, Rhode Island and at the Moscow Contemporary American Series at the Bolshoi Zal in Russia with the support of a grant from Arts International Artists Exploration Fund.

In 2003 Judges was presented as part of Here Arts Center's Culturemart and was performed at the 2003 Novaja New Drama Festival in Moscow, Russia in association with Golden Mask through funding from TCG/ITI International Travel Grants and Arts International Fund for U.S. Artists At International Festivals. Brisco and Margraff lectured and presented songs from the operetta at the 2003 Hydra Rebetiko Conference at the Melina Mercouri Hall Hydra, Greece. The libretto and early score are published by Theater Forum #22: International Theater Journal Winter/Spring 2003. A full-length audio C.D. titled CAFÉ JUDGES; songs and sermons from Judges 19: Black Lung Exhaling has just been released. As a composer/librettist team Brisco and Margraff are now in their second year of residency with "H.A.R.P." Here Artist in Residency Program at Here Arts Center, in New York City.