David Sholl

SHOLL, David An accomplished Boston-area musician and Expressive Realist artist best known in the 1980s as the blistering tenor sax behind Barrence Whitfield and the Savages, and more recently with Four Piece Suit, a band known as the sound of HBO's "Sex and the City", died early Christmas Day 2011 after a lengthy illness. He was 62. Mr. Sholl was a founding member of the Brickbottom Artists Association in Somerville, one of the oldest living and working artists' communities in the country. Started in 1984 by a group of Boston-area artists, Brickbottom offers artists stable, affordable working and living environments where once stood the cannery and bakery of A&P stores on Joy Street in Somerville. Mr. Sholl also founded the JAM program within DARE family services of Somerville where he used music as a bridge to help troubled adolescents in Boston. "Dave was a self-trained painter who wanted to express the world around him creatively in any way he could," said Bill Gilligan, his spouse and partner of seven years, whom Mr. Sholl married this past August in New Hampshire. "He felt art existed as part of our everyday lives which is why his subjects were things like bathtubs, radiators, our dog, Cleveland, the people are all part of it." Born June 26, 1949, in Cleveland, OH, Mr. Sholl began playing the sax in childhood at the suggestion of his older brother, Doug. In Ohio Mr. Sholl attended Cleveland Heights High school where he was a star track and cross country runner. Seeking to quench his creative ambitions he went on to study Art at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, PA. Following college Mr. Sholl moved to New England via Maine, finally settling in the Boston area where some time in 1986, Mr. Sholl heard that local R&B singer Barrence Whitfield was looking to form a new line up. Amazed by the power of Barrence's voice and reputation for extremely high-energy shows and dually intrigued by the lure of a tour, Dave's sax squall in rehearsal convinced Whitfield that Sholl's sound and style was exactly what he was looking for. The Savages toured extensively for almost a decade in the USA, Canada, and Europe, pairing up with some of the great bands of the day, including Los Lobos, George Thorogood, the Fabulous Thunderbirds, and others. Multiple LP albums and CDs were released on labels such as Rounder in America, and New Rose in France. Footage from the many TV and festival appearances is still available on YouTube. Some of the band's best-known original songs were written by Mr. Sholl including "Dust on My Needle", famous for the band's impression of a record-skip, and "Stop Twisting My Arm", which was a hit in the New England area, becoming the "Big Mattress Song of the Week" on the former 104.1 WBCN, Boston's legendary Rock Radio Station. "A highpoint of the Savages set was always the sax feature, where David would get to stretch out on an instrumental number, building to a climactic peak, ending in honking overtones that would drive the audience wild," Said Milt Reder, his long-time friend and Mr. Sholl's bandmate in Four Piece Suit. "Two or three times during a concert set, the band would go into this instrumental mode, which gave the musicians a chance to shine, and gave Barrence's voice a break. David was always at the center of these wide-ranging activities, providing vision, inspiration by example, and always pushing it forward," Reder said. Around 1995, Sholl started to talk with friends about the idea of a separate band that would perform only instrumentals as a former band of his, the Honker Chiefs had done, but draw on a wider range of musical influences, incorporating some of the more exotic, romantic, and humorous styles they had come across in their world travels and record collecting. This was the idea that became Four Piece Suit, which played regularly at Ryles Jazz Club in Somerville. Former bandmate Reder said Four Piece Suit allowed Mr. Sholl the freedom to create his own musical world, as this was truly music beyond category. He was also able to focus on the melodic line from his horn, in a more pure and direct form, as opposed to R&B songwriting, which kept more or less to the Blues. As a live act, Four Piece Suit toured America, put out several CDs, featuring many David Sholl original compositions, and became best known with their release, "Spirito" as the sound of HBO's "Sex and the City", as well as many feature films and television shows.Mr. Sholl is survived by his spouse, William Gilligan, of Somerville; his brothers, Robert and Douglas Sholl, both of Portland, ME; his sisters, Debora Humphreys, of Rancho Palos Verde, CA, sister, and Rebecca Baer, of Peoria, IL, and many nieces and nephews and grand nieces and grand nephews. The family plans to have a public memorial service, celebrating Mr. Sholl's work, art, and music in spring 2012. For guest book please visit www.lehmanreen.com Lehman Reen & McNamara Funeral Home Brighton 617 782 1000