Front and A Bit Off-Center: A Sideman’s Story

Dave Heidt has been playing music since he could roll his lips and bang his fists together. Starting with the organ at 5, he moved on to the trumpet, drums, trombone, and finally the bass where he knew he’d found his niche as the swingin’ sideman.

Involved in every band and orchestra available in Western Montana where he was born, he started working professionally (playing and writing) by the time he was 12 and won first place in a solo performance for the Western Montana Music Festival. 1975 brought him the coveted scholarship to attend the Stan Kenton Jazz Workshop in Northern California.

Quick Steps To The Mother Road

In between gigs teaching, selling instruments (including Hammond organs) and playing, he took to the road in the fall of ’77 and worked with a couple of bands based out of Seattle.

By 1980 his reputation has spread. He was recruited by The Victory Group—a hugely successful band dubbed the “Eagles of the North”—in Canada and signed by RCA Records. They toured Canada and the Northwestern USA, putting out a number of albums until 1983.

The Swingin’ Bassman

Since then, he’s been a full-time musician with several enormously popular bands in Montana, most notably Little Elmo and The Mambo Kings, a boogie-woogie swing bang that whooped its way across the Northwest for more than 10 years, playing at some of the biggest events—and for some of the biggest names—in the region. His reputation for a steady beat and a steady head kept him busy.

The First Sound Board

Dave’s first studio opened in 1994. In 1997 he kicked it up more than a notch with his second studio, in which he produced, engineered, arranged, and performed with dozens of amazingperformers, including Heidi Swan, Jared Stewart, Little Elmo and the Mambo Kings, Rex Reike, the George Groesbech Trio, and 7-Day Run.

Ranging in style from pure pickin’ to all out electric madness to celestial jazz, the Swingin’ Bassman soon got a reputation for making other people sound the way they always wanted to sound.

Singer-songwriters and new bands have continually sought him out not only for his skill as an engineer but for his ability to bring out the best in them, no matter what their level of experience. With a gentle, skilled hand, he has garnered a reputation for helping musicians sound the way they always dreamed.

Music, Music, Music

Whether it’s recording or playing, writing or arranging, it’s always music.   Whether it’s cool jazz or Texas Swing, sweet standards or neck-wrenching rock, it’s what the Swingin’ Bassman does.  It’s what he’ll always do.  These days he’s working with a hot new band in Albuquerque called the Savoy Rhythm Section and filling in with other bands in New Mexico. We’d advise you to stay tuned. Whether it’s the bassman himself or the people he records–either way, you’ll be hearing a lot more from Dave Heidt in the near future.