Brian Wilson Biography

Brian Wilson was born in Inglewood, California in 1942. Brian and his two brothers grew up in a household with an abusive father, but one who steered all three boys toward musical studies.  As a child, Brian was given lessons in voice, piano, and accordion, and a natural ability for composition and theory was apparently not hindered at all by partial deafness in his right ear. By the time he was sixteen, Brian Wilson was using tape recorders to experiment with vocal arrangements and recording.

Brian Wilson was the driving force behind many of the compositions which rocketed the Beach Boys to fame in the 1960’s. Songs such as “Good Vibrations,” “In My Room,” and “California Girls” helped to establish Wilson as perhaps the most talented and accomplished composer in American rock history.
By the 1970’s, the Beach Boys popularity had declined, and Wilson took a lengthy hiatus from the music scene, only occasionally contributing with composition or production. He resurfaced in 1988 with a solo album, featuring the single “Love and Mercy,” around the same time that the Beach Boys enjoyed a brief surge in popularity thanks to the hit single “Kokomo.”

Sweet Insanity (1995) and Imagination (1998) followed, and Brian Wilson began touring and recording some live performances. The results included Live at the Roxy Theater (2000) and Pet Sounds Live (2002.) Getting’ in Over My Head, Wilson’s next studio album, followed in 2004, and That Lucky Old Sun came in 2008. Wilson then signed with Disney for two records in 2009, the first of which was Brian Wilson Reimagines Gershwin, released in 2010. The album features Wilson’s interpretation of classic Gershwin material. In the Key of Disney, a collection of Disney standards and classics, followed in 2011.

Today, Brian Wilson continues to compose and record. In 2012, he and his fellow Beach Boys delighted their fans with a release of a new album, That’s Why God Made the Radio. A few years later, Wilson released the solo album No Pier Pressure (2015), and later that year earned a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song, for “One Kind of Love,” featured in the film Love & Mercy. The movie is a dramatized biopic on Wilson’s life, starring John Cusack, Paul Giamatti, and Elizabeth Banks.