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William Ackerman In 1976, William Ackerman had to borrow $300 to record, manufacture, and distribute his debut, "In Search of the Turtle's Navel," but he sparked a musical revolution that made fingerstyle acoustic guitar one of the most significant instrumental sounds of the past 15 years. Will Ackerman's Guitar Tunings
Like Harrison Ford in Blade Runner, Will Ackerman knows you can't trust memories. Even the ones you don't have--he's never learned anything about his parents or his exact birthday (it's one of three days in November 1949). Adopted by a Stanford University professor and his wife, Ackerman came to America at age nine, a trip that still sometimes seems like a dream. Many times he's seen himself flying over the white cliffs of Dover or standing on the deck of an ocean liner watching the Statue of Liberty come into view. Which part of a life is the reality? Three things about Ackerman we know to be true:
Other parts of the Will Ackerman story are more mysterious. He skipped high school constantly to go surfing, but still did well enough to enter Stanford at age 16. An immigrant from Germany, he flunked German in college. Within a few credits of graduation, suddenly fearing a career in academia, he dropped out to become an apprentice carpenter to a Norwegian boatbuilder. Ackerman is also a polished guitarist who constantly threatens his fingers with power tools. He's a music star who can't read music, having taken only one lesson which consisted of Robbie Basho telling him, "You just want the short lesson? Play guitar on your left knee, and don't be afraid to feel anything." Will started his acoustic music label at the height of disco fever and sold albums in health food stores. He also designed and built his own house on a hill in Vermont's Windham County without any blueprints. When Ackerman borrowed $300 from friends to record his first album, the engineer of the studio he picked at random from the phone book wouldn't let him pay. That album, In Search of the Turtle's Navel, was named one of the "Twenty Albums That Made a Difference" in New Age Journal's January 1995 issue. "I did a record," Ackerman remembers, "we would treat it as a hobby for four years, and the company grew and grew and grew every year by a rate of 600% or more. In 1980 we grew 694%, while spending 4/10 of 1% on advertising." His business card for a while read "Windham Hill Builders/Records/Music BMI." Like Clyde Tombaugh, who looked through a telescope one afternoon in 1930 and found the planet Pluto, Ackerman had discovered an entirely new orbit for the music stores. Windham Hill became the only label with its own section of the store, providing us with George Winston, Michael Hedges, Liz Story, Alex deGrassi, Tuck & Patti, Turtle Island String Quartet, John Gorka, Patty Larkin, Montreux, Nightnoise, and many other fine performers. Through the years, Windham Hill kept two photos of first chairman on file, one in a suit and tie, and one with Ackerman looking happy. The good years finally had a down side when his high profile as a corporate head ultimately led to high blood pressure and an attack of depression. "Once upon a time our titles were jokes, but as a company grows, they cease to be jokes," he says. "One day you can't laugh about it anymore. When you're CEO, you're there, in everybody's pinball machine, and they're firing at you." Ackerman resigned as CEO of Windham Hill in 1984. Returning to his property in Vermont, he sometimes worked as a general contractor or clearing land. At the same time, his phone lines and fax machine stayed connected to the real world, and he never failed to examine any interesting options. In 1992, Ackerman sold his remaining interest in Windham Hill and passed the three years of a non-compete clause developing a spoken word label, Gang of Seven. He also built a state-of-the-art, state of Vermont digital recording studio across the front yard of his house. Ackerman has recently finished recording his tenth album. Or maybe he is out inspecting the trees on his property, body boarding the big waves in Hawaii or thinking about going back to Tibet. Will Ackerman doesn't know where he will end up. He is not even entirely sure down what roads, real or imaginary, he wants to head right now. "People keep asking me for some kind of mission statement," Ackerman says, "and I keep not delivering it." One thing is sure: whatever his destination, the results will be worth of our attention. Will Ackerman interviewed by Anil Prasad © 1999-96 by the Windham Hill Group, all rights reserved. |
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