In his three decades in the music business, Rick Chavez has pretty much done it all as a kind of "Rick-of-all-trades."

From his rock, blues and jazz beginnings to his years as a Vegas cover song artist and studio musician, Rick is now relishing his newfound role as an original recording artist with a pair of upcoming January ‘08 cd releases. You Are Here is Rick's original jazz/fusion release -- his second release is a cd recorded in Vegas' Tequila Bar at Bally's called Live On The Strip.

With so many past and present projects on his resume and a six-day-a-week job in music, you'd think Rick would be ready for something different, or to hang up his guitars and call it quits. No way, he says.

"There's a mysterious source of motivation, musically, for me," Rick says during breaks from his house-artist gig at Bally's Tequila Bar on the Las Vegas strip. "Still, after all these years, I feel a strong spiritual force pushing me to make music. Making a living is one thing, but the desire to make the music... that comes from something special."

As a Vegas cover song artist that has the freedom to mix in his original music on the job, and as a recording artist, Rick wholeheartedly believes "music chooses the artist. I don't choose the music, it chooses me. I don't know where it comes from, but I'm glad I have the desire and drive."

His "desire and drive" and natural born talent were fostered early on in Rick's humble roots, a path that stretches from Las Vegas to Los Angeles, and all the way back to the small town of El Paso, Texas, his birthplace. Rick's older brother played saxophone and sang in an R&B band -- a group Rick credits for inspiring his love of rhythm and blues, and all music.

Before Rick felt that desire and drive to make music, he was first a "huge fan of music." Childhood in El Paso meant hearing lots of country music, and later when the family moved to California, it was a monumental event in music history shared by millions that changed Rick forever.

"I loved listening to music, and was interested in guitar by about age 12," Rick says, "but it was seeing The Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show in '64 that really changed my life."

That was a watershed moment in popular culture for the entire world, a moment that Rick says "totally awed and inspired me to really learn the guitar and to learn how to write and play my own songs."

Rick spent hours hanging out and watching his brother's band perform, and became so focused on learning an instrument that his parents rented him a "big Kay guitar," a funny choice of models because Rick says he was a really skinny kid. Rick stuck with playing, prompting his parents to buy him a guitar -- another Kay, but a model that was more Rick's size. Guitar seemed like an almost pre-destined instrument for Rick to play, with his grandmother and great-grandmother both being accomplished guitarists.

The Chavez family made a few moves from Texas until settling in the Los Angeles area. Rick says he was "always the new kid in school, and being really shy didn't help either." Music and the guitar, he says, were what brought him out of shyness into being one of the cooler kids in school and "the only kid guitar player I knew of."

"Playing guitar and being a musician helped me overcome that teenage social awkwardness," Rick says, laughing as an adult about how he conquered the growing pains we all face as teenagers. Rick's confidence and musical talent grew so quickly that he would write out music at school on paper, and then bring it to his choir teacher, who would in turn play Rick's music on piano.

"I didn't know I was leaning more toward jazz yet," Rick says, "but I was starting to explore music that had strange chords and time signatures."

Rick's varied rock background grew from a love of surf music and The Beatles to encompass a movement in music dubbed "fusion."

"A lot of those players had similar influences to mine, from Frank Zappa, Chicago, Blood, Sweat & Tears, Cream, Jimi Hendrix and Paul Butterfield -- they were all doing the improv-jam thing."

On Rick's official MySpace page at www.myspace.com/rickchavez, he offers up a range of 16 original songs for download from his catalog. The songs run the gamut from ethereal, melodic jazz on songs like "You Are Here," to the gentle Latin percussion of "Rebecca," and the mellow, angelic "Winter Morning." Fans of fusion, jazz, Latin, New Age, soft rock, pop and classical and probably a dozen other music genres will certainly love the songs almost as much as Rick loved writing and recording them.

Back before Calor and You Are Here were even the faintest of glints on his musical horizon, Rick got his first paying music job in college as part of a three-piece band playing in a biker bar. Later, he joined an all-original band that nearly got signed to a record label. One day, a call came that would start Rick down the road of doing studio work.

"They asked me to a flamenco show, and of course I had no idea what flamenco music was," Rick says. "But it was paid rehearsals, and I was definitely up for getting paid. So I went down there, and they handed me a tape."

Rick says his trial-by-fire introduction into the world of flamenco music was difficult at first with the 12/8 rhythms and dependence on watching the dancers for musical cues.

"But man, I practiced and practiced and I practiced, and really learned it," Rick exclaims.

He must have nailed the music, because he worked the flamenco show for over a year. During the flamenco show's run, Rick got another fortuitous call -- this time from one of his friends who was an A&R rep at the old Dunhill Records, home of legendary acts like Jimmy Buffett, James Gang, The Mamas & The Papas, and Steppenwolf.

"He asked me to try out for a band, and I told him I couldn't because I was working seven days a week with the other show," Rick says, his voice growing in excitement as he nears the punch line of his rock & roll tale. "He pushed me to do it, and I went ahead and rehearsed with the band for a couple of weeks. Boy, it got to be exhausting... I lived so far from the rehearsals, and it became terribly tiring and draining. I came to find out later that it was Steely Dan I'd been playing with."

Rick's long and winding music path led him to join a Top 40 cover band that toured the country for several years. During his cover band touring days, Rick started doing jingle-writing work for Mattel, Armour Bacon, and a host of other companies, and earned a solid reputation as a reliable, productive studio musician. With the surge in popularity of disco, Rick says cover bands kind of died out, leading him to start working "a regular job" while pursuing his love of music on the weekends with a big Latin orchestra.

In the mid '90s, Rick moved to Las Vegas to once again pursue music professionally. He formed a duo called Zen Jazz that quickly developed a following, landing the duo on local TV and earning them a second place win as Best Jazz Band in a local Vegas newspaper. Rick's partner in Zen Jazz relocated to L.A., and Rick found himself performing with a couple of casino lounge groups.

Rick also set off on his own, doing solo Nuevo-flamenco shows and his one-man-band performances. Requests from the audience for Bob Marley and Jimmy Buffett covers landed Rick a long run at Vegas' Bahama Breeze venue. During a stint at the Mirage, Rick recorded the instrumental Calor, his first cd, just in time to pass the music on to a radio deejay that wanted to play some of his original music on the air.

The overwhelming response -- and the anticipation for Rick's upcoming release of You Are Here -- feeds into Rick's passion for "affecting people in a positive way with my music," he says. To share Rick's artistic vision and celebrate in his musical passion, be sure to catch him six nights a week at Bally's.

"If someone can listen to my music, and feel a sense of calm when they need it, or if it can inspire someone or help somebody through a rough time, then that's just amazing. Music is a real healing power for me... and a friend for life. It's a conduit that's helped me and everyone around me, and I hope I can touch people's lives and hearts with my words and music.