Tony MacAlpine
Few musicians can claim mastery of an instrument. Tony MacAlpine has claimed two — and spent four decades making both the guitar and keyboard bow to his will.
Born and raised in Springfield, Massachusetts, Tony's musical journey began at age 5 as a piano major at the Springfield Conservatory of Music, studying under Marion Jensen for twelve years. At age 12, he picked up the guitar — and everything changed. A classically trained pianist and violinist, he later pursued formal studies at HARTT College under Professor Raymond Hanson at the University of Hartford.
In 1984, Mike Varney of Shrapnel Records highlighted Tony in his spotlight column in Guitar Player magazine, and a legend was set in motion.
His debut album Edge of Insanity (1986) — featuring Billy Sheehan on bass and Steve Smith on drums — and sophomore release Maximum Security (1987) ignited the neoclassical guitar virtuoso movement of the mid-to-late '80s and remain touchstone records for guitarists worldwide. MacAlpine was quite possibly the first new rock guitar instrumental artist of the decade to surpass 100,000 units sold in the USA.
The momentum never let up. Through the '90s, Tony delivered a string of critically acclaimed albums — Freedom to Fly (1992), Madness (1993), Premonition (1994), and Evolution (1995) — each one showcasing his rare ability to weave classical sophistication, jazz fluency, and hard rock firepower into something entirely his own.
Then came the collaborations that only confirmed his standing among music's elite. In the late '90s, Tony co-founded the progressive rock outfit Planet X alongside Derek Sherinian (Dream Theater, Billy Idol) and Virgil Donati (Steve Vai, Scott Henderson), regularly tearing up stages across Europe and South America. In 1999, bassist Bunny Brunel (Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock) recruited Tony for his jazz-fusion project CAB, alongside drumming powerhouse Dennis Chambers (John McLaughlin, Carlos Santana) and keyboard legend Brian Auger (Tony Williams, Jimi Hendrix). The band's self-titled debut dropped in 2000, followed by the GRAMMY-nominated CAB2 in 2001 — with two more albums and world tours through Europe, Asia, and Russia to follow.
Perhaps the ultimate testament to his versatility came when guitar icon Steve Vai invited Tony into his band, alongside Billy Sheehan on bass. For seven years, Tony performed and toured the globe with Vai — often doubling Vai's blistering leads on both guitar and keyboards simultaneously — playing to hundreds of thousands of fans and appearing on the certified double-platinum DVD Live at the Astoria, London, as well as the G3 '03 Live in Denver and G3 Live in Tokyo DVDs.
In 2006, Shrapnel Records marked Tony's 20-year career with Collection – The Shrapnel Years, a definitive anthology drawing on some of his most electrifying moments, featuring an all-star roster including Steve Smith, Deen Castronovo, Billy Sheehan, and Tony Franklin.
Over the course of his career, Tony has released eleven solo instrumental studio albums, four albums with CAB, three with Planet X, and contributed guitar and keyboards to a vast catalog of recordings by other artists. Whether as a solo artist, bandmate, session player, or producer, Tony MacAlpine remains one of rock's most extraordinary and enduring forces — a musician for whom virtuosity is not a destination, but simply the starting point.