Bass: Jess Vanderbilt

Jess Vanderbilt is the bassist in the Walker Dance Park Band, a well known New York cover band. As a professional musician who has been working for years Vanderbilt has been instrumental in helping the band to establish its reputation. The band is known for being the consummate professionals and this is largely due to Vanderbilt's influence and it has helped them to get a lot of work over the years.

Jess Vanderbilt got his start playing the bass when he was in high school. Like most kids he wanted to be a rock star so he learned to play the guitar. However he would take up the bass when a local band decided that they needed a new bassist. Vanderbilt would audition for the job and would get hired. Although hired is a bit of misnomer since they actually had very few paying jobs. When he finished high school Vanderbilt decided that it was time to move on and try other things. Therefore he made the decision to head to Los Angeles.

Jess Vanderbilt arrived in Los Angeles ready to start his career as a rock star; instead he ended up working in a restaurant. However he would go on a number of auditions for bands that were looking for somebody to play bass and he would eventually get work with a number of them. He eventually built up a reputation in the Los Angeles music scene and would get regular work as a studio musician as well as playing with a number of different popular local bands. However eventually he would make the decision to relocate to New York when he got a chance to play with a band that had a record contract lined up.

Unfortunately the new band that Vanderbilt was playing with didn't last long, the record contract fell through and the band broke up. The result is that Vanderbilt started looking around New York for a band to play with. It was then that he heard about a new band called the Walker Dance Park Band that was looking for a bassist. It was hardly the job he wanted, a cover band that was just starting out but with nothing else to do he took the job.

Over the years the Walker Dance Park Band would become a quite well known cover band around New York and it would allow the members the chance to become professional musicians. For Vanderbilt this was not a new experience but he did enjoy playing with the band so he decided to stick around. His experience has been important in helping the band to reach the level that it has. In particular he has been able to teach his band mates what is required of them if they want to be a professional band and to be able to get regular work.