Chris Lightcap is a bassist and composer with a wide-ranging performing and recording career. He has worked with Regina Carter, Craig Taborn, Marc Ribot, Glen Hansard, Mark Turner, John Medeski, Jason Moran, The Kronos Quartet, Tomasz Stanko, Chris Potter, Paul Motian, John Scofield, Dave Liebman, Jon Irabagon, Paquito D’Rivera, Anthony Braxton, Joe Morris, Joshua Bell, Sheila Jordan, James Carter, Butch Morris, Ben Monder, Mary Halvorson, Julian Lage, Terrel Stafford, Ralph Alessi and many other artists.
Lightcap’s releases as a leader and composer have been featured on year-end top album lists by The New York Times, Rolling Stone, NPR, Downbeat, Jazztimes, the Village Voice and The Wall Street Journal. These include Lay-Up (2000), his debut quartet album on Fresh Sound featuring Tony Malaby, Bill McHenry and Gerald Cleaver, followed up by Bigmouth (2003). This group expanded to a quintet with Craig Taborn and Chris Cheek on Deluxe (2010) and Epicenter (2015) which were released on the Clean Feed Label under the name Chris Lightcap’s Bigmouth. In 2014 Lightcap assembled Superette, an all-electric band featuring Jonathan Goldberger and Curtis Hasselbring on guitars and Dan Rieser on drums. Superette released its debut recording on Royal Potato Family Records in 2018 featuring guests Nels Cline and John Medeski. Finally, Lightcap’s most recent release is SuperBigmouth (2019) on the Pyroclastic label. This album features an octet that combines both the Bigmouth and Superette ensembles. Lightcap has led various groups at major festivals around the world including Earshot, Willisau, Saalfelden, North Sea, Porto, Geneva, Ljubljana, Maribor, Edinburgh and Guimaraes.
He currently performs with a variety of groups, including Regina Carter’s touring and recording ensembles, the Matt Wilson Quartet, Nels Cline’s Consentrik Quartet, the Jon Irabagon Quartet, Craig Taborn’s Daylight Ghosts and the Ghost Train Orchestra.
In 2011 and 2016 Lightcap was awarded Chamber Music America’s “New Jazz Works” commission grants. He has also received generous composing and production grants from The Shifting Foundation. In 2006 Lightcap was commissioned to write “Wiretap” for the contemporary chamber ensemble counter)induction and he has also contributed compositions and arrangements to albums released by Regina Carter, Matt Wilson, Chad Taylor, Mary Halvorson, Rob Brown and others.