Biograpy
Roger Pedersen has been a semi- pro guitarist for much of his adult life. His music career began when he was 16 years old and was guitarist for Svein Arild Johannessen, radio man for the legendary Radio West in Stavanger. Out of this came a Vinyl Single and some gigs in Stavanger District (1986).
In 1987, he joined as a guitarist in Kenneth Pedersen’s solo project. The result here was a demo recorded in Fitjar music studio. One studio that, among other things, was used by Lava.
1988 started a bunch of friends up the AOR band "Heaven". A self-financed vinyl single was recorded at Rainbow studios in Oslo. This came on the national music charts and led to a national record deal with “Slagerfabrikken”. The band topped Norwegian charts for many weeks in 1989, and was high up on the legendary radio program "Ti I skuddet." Heaven toured large parts of Norway.
1991: Heaven recorded the music video and released the single "Children of our time". Just before the recording of the new CD should take place, the inner struggles were so large that the band disbanded. Roger then broke up and started Sound Trip in 1994 with Vidar Støyva, Kjetil West, Arve Risløv and Frode Tjøsvoll. They gave out the CD "So sorry". Toured a bit for a while in Norway, played at Smuget in Oslo, Trøkkeriet in Bergen, Mandal, Odda, Haugesund and Stord. Disbanded when Roger began to study.
Roger and several of the members of Sound Trip, and Christan Welde and Kjersti Misje started the jazzband "Jazzjunkies". They were in many years, a fixed element in the Silda Jazz i Haugesund. One of the highlights must be said to be the backing band for Ann Farholdt. During this period, Roger worked as a guitar teacher at Karmøy music school.
Parallel to that, Roger played in the top 40 band Weelers and Deelers, now New Deal.
Since the fall of 2000, Roger worked as a Teacher at the school Sandve in Karmøy, where he teaches most subjects.
Now he plays with M & M at the same time as he work on more creative projects, like his solo career and dTales. dTAles has two releases, "People are talking," and “Reach out”. Roger is also included in the "local-legendary" dance band "Hard to Handle".
The fall of 05 was Roger hired in as a guitarist in Karmøy event performance "So va ka då da - por favor". It had 6 full houses in cinema Kopervik, and 6 full houses in the Hotel Maritim Haugesund.
The first Radio single from dTales was sent around to all the radio stations in Norway, January 2006, and it has been well noted in the media. The full CD was released May the 1th, 2006 with Mudi as national distributor. The CD is available on Itunes international, as well as among fifties other network-providers-mainly from the United States. In Norway and Europe is the CD to get at CDon.
Summer / fall 07 was dTales in the studio (h-music) and finished 8 songs for a new cd-release. A video was released in May 2008. CD was released in June, 2008.
February 2009 edition of U.S. Guitar Player magazine USA has a review of Roger Pedersen of the Slot "Editor Boy's Big Eight," on page 28
Editor Michael Molenda of Guitar Player Magazine writes this about Roger Pedersen's music and playing:
"Pedersen's notes seem to bounce off his fingers like kernels in a popcorn machine. His wonderfully off-kilter melodies and slippin' and slidin' bends add to the illusion that you're being pelted by shards of strange yet beguiling music. This is a good lesson on employing formidable technique in a uniquely musical way." (Michael Molenda, editor of Guitar Player magazine).
Guitar Player magazine is considered to be the most credible and respected guitar publication worldwide. Flagship magazine of The Music Player Network, Guitar Player, reaches 154,000 dedicated musicians (guitarists) worldwide each month.
Summer 2010 West Audio and Universal released the album "Kernels in a Popcorn Machine". Roger has got many smashing good reviews of this album. Guitar Magazine Uk wrote: "Opening with zappy acrobatic riffing that sounds, well, quite unlike anything we’we ever heard, Pedersen hammers his way through 14 track of some of the most inventive fretwork around. Warp Speed Monkey encapsulates this Norwegian oddball perfectly; weird and wonderful shredding that’ll have even the most proficient players agape." You can find more nice reviews here!
January 2011 Norwegian TV 2 made a feature about Roger Pedersen and his guitar playing on their evening news show.
August 2012 NRK TV 1 sent a military air show where they used "Warp Speed Monkey" from the CD "Kernels in a Popcorn Machine".
Roger released a new CD, his second guitar album "More is More", April 2013. The CD got great reviews all over the world (look under the "Media" section).
August 2013 the most popular TV-program i Norway played from More is More, as a Cruise Ship (Hurtigruta) went from the North to the South of Norway direct on NRK TV 1. The title of the show was Sommerbåten 2013 (summerboat 2013). During the month long show, they played Roger's music five times.
In July 2015 NRK TV1 played Roger's song "Northern lights" in the program "Norge Rundt".
May 13th. 2016 Roger released his third album "Guitar Madness and other nice songs" on West Audio. The album got great reviews all over the world (look under "Media" section).
In 2018 Roger got the neurological motor disorder "musician's dystonia" and could not play the guitar any more. The diagnose is for life, but in 2023 Roger started playing some guitar, although not like before.
Under the Pandemi, Roger collaborated with the singer Tony Poptamas. Roger wrote the music, produced and tracked most of the instruments. Kjetil Ulland at ABC- Studio did the mixing and mastering:
"I hit him in the face" (October 29. 2021) was the first song released in the collaborative project between Roger Pedersen and Tony Poptamas. Roger is the composer. Roger has produced and recorded the various instruments. It is released on the Stavanger-based record company Forte Music. The single got quite a buzz in Romania.
"Goodbye to You" (April 29. 2022) was the second song released in the collaborative project between Roger Pedersen and Tony Poptamas. Roger has composed "Goodbye to you", produced and recorded the various instruments.
"Die for you" (april 21. 2023) is the third song released in the collaborative project between Roger Pedersen and Tony Poptamas. Roger is the composer, Tony the lyricist. Roger has produced and recorded the various instruments and it is released on the Stavanger-based record company Forte Music.