Portrait

Roland Cabezas | Guitarist & Singer | Recording Artist | Studio Services

Roland, son of Spanish/German parents, based in Hamburg (Germany) and Málaga (Spain), has worked as a professional musician in Europe and all over the world since 1988. In 1994 Roland graduated with vocational honors from Hollywood/California’s renowned Musicians Institute (GIT).

He has performed and/or recorded over the years with artists such as Toni Braxton, Marcus Miller, Trilok Gurtu, Jan Garbarek, Shankar Mahadevan, Omar Sosa, NDR bigband, Deodato, Simon Phillips (TOTO), Gary Husband, Oumou Sangare, Horacio „El Negro“ Hernandez, Deodato, Colin Towns, Jaques Morelenbaum, João Bosco and many others ….

Starting in 1999, the early 2000s saw Roland working with German pop-act Orange Blue, recording guitars & bass on their platinum-album „In Love With A Dream“ as well as co-writing and adding a second lead vocal to their Walt Disney release „Can Somebody Tell Me“ from the motion picture „Dinosaur“.

Since 2004 several releases for the Westlondon-based NuJazz labels Papa Records and Defected Records carry his signature funkguitar riffs, produced by talented keyboarder / producer Simon Grey (former tour member of Incognito).

2006 he joined the touring band of Indian drum & percussion virtuoso and world music great Trilok Gurtu, formerly member of world-fusion pioneers Oregon and the trio of guitar legend John McLaughlin amongst many others.

During fall 2008 Roland recorded all guitars, add. percussion & vocals on the Trilok Gurtu album „massical“ (BHM 2009), everything tracked at his own studio. Towards the end of 2009 he also had the pleasure to play a Warner Bros. showcase with multiple Grammy Award winner Toni Braxton featuring him on acoustic guitar, teaming up with renowned piano player & M.D. Rob Lewis.

The Trilok Gurtu w/ Simon Phillips + NDR bigband project was recorded in 2010 and got released in Feb. 2011 under critical acclaim with the album „21 Spices“ (BirdJAM 2011), featuring Roland C. as a guest soloist alongside worldmusic bass legend Michel Alibo.

Summer 2011 proved to be quite a highlight in his career, giving him the oportunity to play with basslegend Marcus Miller (with Trilok Gurtu & Band) at the „Festival Of The Arts“ (Gdansk/Poland) for an enthusiastic crowd.

Since 2013 Roland is focusing more on his own career as an artist, occasionally taking on a few side projects like appearences on albums with JAZUL (produced by Nils Landgren / 2013), two JAZULDuo releases (2015 & 2018) and one album with acoustic Soul/Jazz-Trio SIDE BY SIDE (2017).

In 2017 he was invited once more by the NDR BigBand, this time to play a few shows with Brazilian MPB legend João Bosco (with drummer Kiko Freitas), including a worldwide streaming-concert.

Besides working as a sideman for many projects, his recently founded label & studio ROLCAB MUSIC is set out to be a platform for creativity as well as providing studio services, tracking and remote sessions worldwide.

Also being a respected guitar instructor (amongst others at HfMT Hamburg College of Music) he is, when not freelancing, back in the studio working on his upcoming solo-album to be released in 2022 – stay tuned !!!

© Copyrights: Roland Cabezas 2018 | Screendesign: Sven Gordon Williams