"When I was growing up in Burlington, Vermont, my parents persistently tried to stop the latent musician in me (age 3) from swearing ad nauseam, running around naked, and urinating in the neighbor's sandbox. For some odd reason, my clothing of choice at that time consisted of thigh-high leather boots, a bath towel fashioned as a cape, and a sweet Gene Simmons-esque silver/bloodied facial make-up design.  I used to jump around on the coffee table singing "Detroit Rock City" while strumming a wooden Bjorn Borg tennis racket!

It didn't stop there. Like all junior high kids in the late 80's, listening to Stryper and Dokken (and maybe some RATT) in 7th grade further intensified my glam heavy metal urges. So, I went out and bought my first bass, a Pearl White, 4-String Fretted Westone.

During high school, I held high-ranking chairs as a violist in numerous All-District, All-State, and All-New England Festival Orchestras. I was then recruited to play competitive soccer at Bates College, in Lewiston, Maine (BA Music Performance, 1996), where I was fortunate enough to study viola performance and analysis with Julia Adams of the Portland String Quartet. My compositional course work included "The Analysis of Electroacoustic Composition" with Professor Simon Waters during a semester abroad at the University of East Anglia, School of Music, Norwich, England, in 1995.

My Senior Thesis project was entitled: "A Performance and Analysis of Selected Works for Viola": Ernest Bloch's Meditation, Mozart's Violin/Viola Duet: K423, Alan Hovhaness' Chahagir for Solo Viola, and Dvorak's String Quartet No. 6 in F Major, Opus 96 ("American"). I was asked by the faculty to perform this quartet during the college's convocation and awarding to famed Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, the honorary doctor of humane letters degree in April, 1996.

After I graduated from Bates College, I was accepted into the Master of Music in String Performance program at the Boston Conservatory for both viola and electric bass. But I decided to head to New York City instead to pursue corporate opportunities in internet business development just as things were heating up in the Dotcom world.  During my time in New York City, I worked full-time in senior business development and executive production management capacities at Sony Corporation Of America (Sony Online Ventures and Sony Music Worldwide Radio Networks), News Corporation (FOX Sports Online), theglobe.com, and Opus360 Corporation (FreeAgent.com).  Thankfully, several of these companies yielded successful initial public offerings!  After leaving the corporate world, I have been musically active as a professional bassist/violist/composer/string orchestrator in Brooklyn, NY, West Chester, PA, Chicago, IL, and Los Angeles, CA.

FEAR THE DOLLS!!

Alongside avidly promoting and raising awareness about my own unique composition and collaboration projects, I also stay busy taking on recording session sideman work as a freelance string orchestrator, electric bassist, and violist for a wide variety of label-backed artists, independent bands, and Motion Picture and Television projects that often feature some of the world's top musicians, producers, and engineers.  For freelance string orchestration projects (based in my Los Angeles network), I also serve as the primary string contractor and transcription/copyist which further ensures that a string tracking session will go as smoothly and caffeinated as possible. 

Utilizing my diverse musical skill set and an exceptional business sense, I aim to exceed the client's wishes.  My enthusiasm and passion for musical creation promotes effective collaboration that ultimately raises the level of play of those around me.  Drawing from my strong project management background, I give my clients the detailed attention and focus they deserve! 

You can e-mail me at jay AT jayterrien DOT com or you can MYSPACE me if you would like to discuss my current working rates and availability for a string arrangement project, a studio recording session, or a live concert performance opportunity. 

You can also find me catching up with fellow bassists and gear aficionados at industry-trade shows like NAMM or at bass-specific online communities such as TalkBass.com, Extendedrangebassist.com, and The Bottom Line.

Equipment Specs and Endorsements (For All Of You Gearheads):

Basses: 1.) Status Graphite Stealth-2 6-String Headless Fretless Bass (Tuned EADGCF or EBDF#C#E)

2.) *2* Parker Fly Bass 5-String Fretted (Tuned EADGC, DADF#C#, or BADF#C#)

3.) Custom 4-String Fretted with Schoales neck (Piccolo Bass, Tuned EADG)

4.) Martin HD-28 Acoustic Guitar (Tuned EADGCF)

5.) Nordy vJ5 5-String Jazz Bass (With Aguilar OBP-3 Pre-amp)

Strings: D'Addario XL's Custom 4+5-String Sets, with Low B and High C for altered tunings (E-C Tuning: .120, .85, .65, .45, .32)
Status Graphite HotWire Strings Doubleball Custom Gauges for 6-String Status Custom Fretless
(E-F Tuning: .100, .80, .60, .40, .30, .20)

Amps: Epifani UL-502 Bass Head

Carvin PB500 Head with Carvin 4X10 and 1X18 cab
(FOR SALE: E-mail jay AT jayterrien DOT com)

Effects: Digitech BP8 Preamp Processor, Boomerang Phrase Sampler V2.0, BOSS TU-2 Chromatic Tuner, Peterson StroboStomp Virtual Strobe Pedal Tuner, DOD Stereo Flanger, Monster and Spectraflex Bass Cables, MXR Bass DI+, Comfort Strapp Bass Straps

Recording: Digidesign Pro Tools LE Version 7.3.1 for Digi002 Hardware, KORG D-1600 Digital Studio, Alesis M1 Active Mk2 Monitors, Rode NTK Tube Condenser Mic, Rode NT5 Condenser Pair, Roland D-50 Linear Synthesizer

Computer Specs: Customized Hand-built PC With Win XP Pro, AMD Athlon XP 2200+/266 FSB Processor CPU, Asus VIA A7V333 Chipset ATX Motherboard w/ RAID, 3 IBM 80GB Hard drives, Micron 512MB 64x64 PC2100 DDRAM RAM, Promise Controller Card ULTRA133TX2.

eMachines 6811 Laptop running Pro Tools LE 7.3.1 (Digi002)