If you’re in the Killington region, Nick Bredice is a name you’re hopefully familiar with. If you’re in other parts of the state, he might be playing near you since he now plays about 275 days a year. Sometimes those days have two or three gigs. Nick struggled with quitting his full time job with the State of Vermont, but he was in high demand which made the decision easier. He became a full-time musician at the end of 2023, but was doing 20 shows a month at the end of 2022, while having the full-time job. I learned about Nick when he played the Killington Farmers’ Market in 2022, but didn’t meet him until 2023. He played it during COVID, in 2021 as well. Max Elles from the First Stop Board Barn said, “He is an awesome dude. If you have an opportunity to see him, definitely do so.” Now, I wholeheartedly agree with those statements.
Nick said most of his show revolves around live looping. “It allows me to give off a more full sound than a traditional solo acoustic act. My catalog includes my influences; the Grateful Dead, Phish. I’ve been listening to bluegrass like Billy Strings, and play some more traditional, older bluegrass numbers.”
Nick’s first public gig was in Simsbury, CT in 2009, when he was 12. It was a duo with Ryan Riley on keys. Riley was a drummer in the band Nick played with while he was growing up. The band was called “Harmonic Rewalk” and they played in the Hartford, CT area and summers on the Cape. That band broke up in 2014 when they all went off to college. He didn’t have a solid project for about 6 years, up till the pandemic. Nick went to UVM, and was living in Burlington. He played in that scene occasionally at Nectar’s, Skinny Pancake and Radio Bean. Nick said, “Ironically I didn’t start really doing the solo thing until after COVID but during I was doing the Farmers’ Market. I was kind of doing it out of necessity, Government, The world, was saying not to hang out with your friends so that meant playing music alone too. It was good for me because that’s when I moved back to Bridgewater, hung out at the farmhouse and really developed the solo catalog. I didn’t expect it to become the bulk of my work load.”
Nick said it was never his intention to play as many shows as he does now (275+ a year). He added, “I love it. I work really hard at it. For one reason, or another, people keep asking me to come back.”
Nick grew up in Simsbury. He started taking lessons on guitar when he was six in 2002. His dad bartered guitar lessons for Nick, and piano lesson for his sister, in exchange for building a studio. His dad owned a construction company. He took lessons for three years, and also played the trumpet in his middle school band. Nick said, “I dabble in other instruments, piano, bass, just don’t play them live…yet.”
Nick’s musical influences obviously include The Dead and Phish but his biggest influence is Mihali Savoulidis, formerly of Twiddle, and now out on his own. Nick said, “He was a huge influence around the time I started school in Burlington. When I started doing the solo thing, a lot of it was inspired by his work as a solo act. It’s funny because his focus then was Twiddle.” Nick has a few musical influences from CT like Will Evans of Barefoot Truth and two good friends of mine, Jamie Livesey (Jamie’s Junk Show) and Kenny Mehler. Nick added, “My parents have known Jamie since 1989. They’ve been weekend warriors in Killington since the late ’80s. They would drag me, reluctantly or not, to happy hours at The Grist Mill to watch Jamie play, and then like in the same week we’d be back in CT and go out for pizza in Glastonbury, on a school night, and there’s Jamie playing again. It was really cool. I can remember when I was 10 or 12, and Jamie would ask if I was practicing my guitar, now here we are sharing the stage which feels pretty full circle. Kenny, in my opinion, is an incredible singer-songwriter. My dad had a CD that had “Kenny Live” sharpied on it. The show was at the Pickle Barrel on March 27, 2011. I listened to that in his truck, driving up to Killington on the weekends, I hadn’t seen Kenny live at this point, but I was just thinking wow. That CD wound up living in the center console of his truck. 15 year old me was definitely hooked. He also had a CD of Kenny’s old band Five Wise from January 19, 2002 at the Wobbly Barn (I DJ’d that show). I never saw Five Wise but I listened to that CD all the time.”
The Killington music scene has some amazing acts. Nick said, “I’ve always said the Killington Access Road acoustic apres is a genre of it’s own. I think Kenny’s sound is quintessentially that.” Nick and Zach Yakaitis had the pleasure of having Kenny sit in with them at a Jax show and Nick got to perform a duo show with him at the Moguls, both in 2023. Nick said, “Kenny has that rock star presence, at least in my mind, but he’s cool just playing the same stages as us.” Another huge influence of Nick’s is Annie in the Water, who he sits in with from time to time.
Nick has written music which he calls “both therapeutic, and frustrating.” He added, “I think good songwriting comes out of organic inspiration or some sort of natural catalysts like an event as opposed to writing out of necessity. I play a lot of covers which is the nature of the gig but I don’t want to spend my whole career playing other people’s music. Finding the time to formalize a lot of those ideas is impossible so a lot of it doesn’t see the stage.” Nick has about 6 songs now, and the hope is for an album in the future.
Nick likes being his own boss. He said, “I like having full creative control, not just the show but where I get to play. I treat this solo act as it’s own project than can evolve in any direction I please. It’s very freeing. I’m going to keep taking it one show at a time.”
