Bill Frisell – HuffPost 9.6.10

Mike Ragogna: From your first solo album till now, how do your feel you’ve progressed as an artist?

Bill Frisell: Oh man, I don’t know. I hope I’m progressing. That’s what’s so amazing about music; every time you start doing it, every moment is like you’re at the beginning. In a way, I feel the same way I did when I first picked up a guitar as a kid, you know? It’s like, “Whoa, what am I going to do with this thing?” There’s all the music out in front of you that you haven’t gotten to, and it’s infinite, what you haven’t done yet, you know? So, in that way it always feels kind of the same. I guess I’ve gotten somewhere, but I’m just in it. I guess if I’ve learned anything, I’m trying to be comfortable with that and see it as a good thing. If you think about that too much, it’s kind of overwhelming.

MR: Are you happy with where you are now as an artist?

BF: I feel like I’ve been just incredibly lucky, really, my whole life, with the people that I’ve come in contact with that have encouraged me with the music. On this new album, that title song, “Beautiful Dreamer,” I dedicated to one of my childhood friends who just passed away a couple of months ago. He was one of those guys, when I met him when I was twelve years old, he had an electric guitar and he showed it to me. He sort of stuck with me my whole life, coming to all my gigs and being a kind of cheerleader for me. There have been a lot of people like that around, and I wouldn’t probably be playing if it wasn’t for all of those people helping me out. I don’t think there’s anyway you can do this by yourself.