Craig Collins Turner
Craig started playing guitar at age 10, and within a few years was serious about the instrument and music in general. He got his first “real” guitar at age 15. That 1974 Gibson Les Paul became CCT’s main guitar for the rest of his career.
He began studying with guitar legend Bud Dashiell, learning jazz style chord voicing and accompaniment. The next step in his education was a chance to study with guitar virtuoso Ted Greene. Ted introduced Craig to modal scales and the art of improvisation. Hours and hours of practice ensued……….. Things were starting to change.
At this point in time, Craig was playing in cover bands doing the usual events such as dances, weddings, etc., but was starting to write original material as well. Thus began the realization that this was the direction he wanted to go.
Craig was a rock guitar player at heart even though most of his musical education up to that point had a distinctly jazz/fusion flavor. That changed when he met Randy Rhoads.
“I had heard from a friend that I should go see this guitarist in a local band called Quiet Riot. I did and was amazed! I had never studied with a Rock player but decided I desperately wanted to study with Randy. I came back to see QR the next night and saw Randy heading into the club and asked about taking lessons. I’ll never forget pulling up outside his house for that first lesson and hearing this blazing guitar coming from inside. Randy asked how long I had been playing, which was about 10 years at that point, and he seemed a bit surprised. He asked me to improv over a chord progression. We finished and he looked at me and said “I can’t teach you anything”. Needless to say, I was quite flattered but was completely shocked. I don’t remember my exact words but they were something along the lines of “when you play, people go crazy….with me…not so much” LOL. So, I guess Randy thought about it a bit and decided that there might be some things he could show me after all…cool!!!! My lessons were supposed to be half hour lessons, but were never less than an hour and a half. I studied with him for about 3 months and at that unbeknownst to me, last lesson, he said he had nothing else to show me, that he wasn’t going to teach me anymore, and that it was time for me to go off on my own…...I was bummed. Catching me completely off guard, Randy asked if I’d be interested helping him teach at his Mom’s school as he had so many students that he couldn’t handle them all. So, I started teaching at Musonia handling his overflow. After a few months, Randy got the gig with Ozzy and I took over teaching all of his students as well as my own.”
Craig had been attending Cal State University Northridge(CSUN) as a Music major and continued to teach at Musonia for almost a year until he entered GIT(now known as MI) as a student. After graduating from GIT, Craig came back to teach at Musonia (George Lynch, among others had stepped in to teach while Craig was attending GIT) and continued to be the head guitar instructor there for the next 8 years.
In 1987, Craig was hired on as an instructor at GIT and became a full time staff instructor within a short period of time. At GIT, he taught private lessons, Harmony and Theory classes, had multiple weekly open counseling sessions as well teaching seminars in improvisation and elements of his personal rock style and technique. CCT continued to teach at GIT until the beginning of 1996.
During his 15+ years as an instructor, it’s estimated that Craig taught between 2500 to 3000 students. Some feel that estimate is conservative.
“I loved teaching and feel truly fortunate to have had that opportunity to teach at both Musonia and Musicians Institute as well as my private students on the side. To all those students……thank you so much for the great times and support for all those years”.
Magazines:
Craig was featured in numerous magazines during that period. In the April ’85 Spotlight column in Guitar Player Magazine, Mike Varney wrote,” Craig’s style falls somewhere between Randy Rhoads and Edward Van Halen, utilizing an extensive vocabulary of pyrotechnic licks, including grinding harmonic squeals, fast melodic scales, and wide-stretching legato trills that are highly arranged”.
In the February ’91 issue of Guitar For The Practicing Musician, their comment was “Be it arrangement, accompaniment or solos, Craig is a true professional, in control of every moment even as he roars and rocks out. He is one of the best modern metal guitarists I’ve run across……..”
UK’s Metals Forces magazine wrote, “All in all a true guitar hero. Someone should pick up on this guy and make him famous…….Craig’s name will be on the tips of everyone’s tongues”
Metal Mania’s Feb/88 issue stated that “Craig Turner is a guitarist to reckon with. He is truly one of tomorrow’s superstars”.
Express magazine’s Lemmi Loud wrote “Craig Turner will soon be listed next to the Van Halen’s and Malmsteen’s”.
LA Rocker Magazine had an issue titled L.A.’s Guitar Heroes in which they said, “Despite the similarity in sound, Craig does not use any right hand technique(tapping), but rather uses wide interval stretch licks to create a similar effect…..He has developed a trademark with his sure hit pick harmonics and has developed them to a science…….His wide vibrato and pick harmonics have caused a lot of people to infer that he uses a tremolo but he does not”.
Craig also wrote instructional “Master Class” and “Metal Shop” columns for Guitar School magazine in ‘90/’91 teaching aspects of his unique style and technique.
CCT was also featured and written about in quite a few international magazines such as Burrn/Japan, Le Ame Du Fonde/France, etc.
Bands and Sessions:
After playing in the above mentioned “cover” bands, Craig joined Grand Theft. This was his first all original hard rock band, a three piece with lead singer, and paired Craig with Randy’s older brother Kelle Rhoads on lead vocals. Grand Theft played the local LA area club scene and developed a decent size following.
In 1981, CCT joined forces with original Quiet Riot drummer Drew Forsyth and formed Network. Network became a headlining act and drew label attention from MCA and Warner Bros. as well as local radio airplay with one of their songs “It’s Me You Could’a Had” reaching the #23 spot. It was during this period that CCT started to break new ground in the hard rock genre with his use of complex chording as opposed to the traditional “barred/power chord” that had always been the norm.
“I was really interested in trying to bring a bit more musicality to the genre. I started voicing even relatively simple chords like minor 7’s etc differently so that they would work with a distorted sound. I continued along that path and was using all sorts of chording that was definitely not common at all. Minor 9’s, 6/9’s, minor 11’s, add 9’s, Dom 7#5#9’s etc. as well as wide interval “stretch” voicings. I loved working up those voicings , making them work with a heavy guitar sound……and they looked cool to boot, LOL.
With Network, Craig’s guitar playing began to garner attention from the media as well as other artists…….so much so that his unique style became “in demand” for session work.
Craig recorded for such diverse acts ranging from Bonnie Pointer(Pointer Sisters) to Quiet Riot. With QR, he was initially called in to redo all the guitar tracks on the demo that QR was recording for Pasha Records. CCT was then asked to play live with QR and did so for about 6 months all the while still in Network. More often than not, Craig was called in to do solos for a particular artists song’s, and did so for international artists as well as US acts. One of those solos was featured in the Bonnie Pointer song “The Beast In Me” which was part of the “Heavenly Bodies” movie soundtrack and video.
Craig’s playing also came to the attention(for the first time) of the Ozzy Osbourne camp by pure accident when future Slaughter bass player Dana Strum got word that Craig was indeed a guitar player that Ozzy needed to hear.
“Network was in the process of auditioning singers, which we seem to spend quite a bit of time doing LOL, and a friend of the singer we were auditioning was listening from outside. Apparently he called Dana, who was tasked with locating potential guitar players for Ozzy to audition. I got the call, was told to be at a particular recording studio and be prepared to lay down solo guitar tracks. From those sessions, Ozzy chose three players that he wanted to audition…….myself, George Lynch, and Jake E. Lee. Ozzy brought the band to LA with Jake going in first. Before George or I could audition, Ozzy headed back to England as wife Sharon was about to give birth. The decision was made to fly both George and I, separately, over to the UK to continue. George went first. Ozzy had a 6 week tour in the US booked which didn’t leave time for me to be flown to England, so Ozzy decided to take Jake on the short tour. I had been given a copy of the full contract at this point so was still hopeful. During the tour, Dana Strum kept in contact with me every week to update me on the goings on. As the tour was getting towards the end, Dana called and told me that Ozzy had decided that he was not going to go with Jake and that now it was between me and Mark St. John who was in Kiss at that time…..looking pretty good still!!!! A week later, Dana called and said that “Oz” had changed his mind and decided to use Jake because he liked his look and stage presence. That obviously would have been a career making gig for me”.
Although not getting the guitar slot in Ozzy’s band was a huge disappointment, Craig’s being a top contender didn’t hurt in name recognition and interest among those that followed Rock’s up and coming guitar heroes.
Network had gone through numerous member changes and had reformed as Highlander. The new band set out to build a following in the LA club scene and once again became a headlining act. A street buzz and demo brought the attention of Warner Bros records and a private showcase was requested. The first comment of Warner’s A&R exec at this showcase was “wow, you guys can really play”. The Highlander demo was brought to the table at WB, but was ultimately passed on as Warner’s had two hard rock acts at the time(Van Halen and the Bulletboys) and had no budget for another hard rock act.
Another surprise phone call came in….this time from Ozzy’s road manager. Since Craig had been a top contender that last time around, they wanted to see him again.
“This time I was asked to come to a rehearsal studio on North Hollywood to play with the band minus Ozzy. I was told which songs I would be needed to know and that, if the band liked my playing, they would record the session. We did the first tune and bass player Phil Soussan walked over and hit the record button. We did a couple more of Oz’s songs and got along well with both Phil and drummer Randy Castillo. I got a call back telling me that I was the first one Ozzy wanted to see, and was given the date, the next set of songs that we’d be playing and was told to have a “guitar solo” prepared. I showed up at the appointed time, Ozzy was a bit late(hour and a half and quite tipsy), and wanted to started with Crazy Train. I never was one to learn other’s licks etc. but if I had to play someone else’s stuff….well, Randy’s was about as good as it got for me. If memory serves, we did Bark At The Moon next and then I was asked to do my “guitar solo”. I was about half way through and Ozzy walked up and motioned for me to stop. I did and he gestured two handed tapping technique and said “don’t you do any of that Van Halen stuff?” I replied that I didn’t really because everyone else did. I’ll never forget the perplexed look he had. He turned to walk away with bassist Phil asking, “Oz, don’t you want to do any more songs with Craig?”
Highlander continued on for a while but with the popularity of hard rock/metal in the late 80’s starting to dwindle, the band broke up.
Craig was still a full time staff instructor at MI and decided that a different approach was needed. He bought some recording gear and set up a small studio in his home with the intent of focusing on recording as opposed to live playing as the hey days of building a following to attract label attention were no longer a viable means to the elusive record deal.
CCT hooked up with what turned out to be his favorite singer to work with, Kyle Michaels. The two started writing and recording with the intent of shopping the songs with the labels as well as publishing companies. They decided to call their project “Judgement Day”. They recorded two demos in the little home studio, and began their search for some interest. Unfortunately, the early 90’s brought with it Grunge music and a general lack of interest from the music business towards hard rock/metal. The most telling and common phrase that Craig and Kyle heard was “the stuff’s great, but you guys aren’t really the flavor of the month any longer”.
Craig had been asked by students and fans for some instrumental work for quite some time, but he had been focused on band oriented music and hadn’t written let alone recorded any instrumental material. The state of the music biz at this time and the lack of interest in hard rock in general swayed CCT into finally writing and recording some original instrumental songs which will be listed here as well as some of the other material that Craig has recorded.
A collection of original instrumental music, recorded in the last year of Craig's life, will be released in the near future. Watch for updates on this website.
Endorsements:
Craig was endorsed by D’Addario strings and by Kramer guitars for a period of time.
Gear:
Craig’s live rig changed over time of course, but the core was always a pair of 100 watt Marshall heads run through 2 or 4 4X12 cabinets depending on the situation. He always ran a stereo setup with a Multivox stereo chorus unit as the stereo splitter and used an analog Roland delay unit to thicken the sound with a 35ms delay between the two sides.
Both Marshall heads were modified with effects loops so that the main amp, a ’77 JMP was used as the “tone” head while the second Marshall, a ’80 JCM 800 was used strictly as a power amp to run the other side. Craig ran a custom built “gain” preamp into the front end of the JMP to boost input going in. Other than that one module, all other effects were patched in through the effects loop of the JMP. The rack mount effects, again changed over time, but generally consisted of various delay units, mixers, and EQ’s. Craig used a Digitech 2101 in the studio in some cases vs. his standard live rig when the situation warranted.
Influences:
“There were many phenomenal guitar players that I admired and respected obviously, but I’d have to say that the three that had the biggest impact on my style, i.e. the one’s that I can hear their influence in my playing would be Robin Trower early on, then Randy Rhoads, and finally Allan Holdsworth”.