Jacob Jolliff is a mandolin player, composer, and singer from Newberg, Oregon. He went to Berklee College of Music on a full scholarship, won the National Mandolin Championship at Winfield, Kansas, in 2012, and played with the Boston string band Joy Kills Sorrow. In 2014 he replaced Jeff Austin in Yonder Mountain String Band and toured with them through 2019. He now leads the Jacob Jolliff Band.
Why Jolliff matters
Jolliff has some of the strongest technique of any mandolin player of his generation. He spent his Berklee years locked in a practice room working on his right hand, and it shows: his playing is fast, precise, and fluent across bluegrass, jazz, and his own instrumental music. He brought that skill to the jamgrass world with Yonder Mountain, and now writes and leads progressive instrumental string band music of his own.
Life and career
Jolliff grew up in a musical family in Newberg, Oregon. His father started him on mandolin at seven and required ten minutes of practice a day. In middle school he joined his dad’s bluegrass gospel band, Jacob Henry and Bill Jolliff, and toured the Northwest playing festivals and churches.
In 2007 he won a full scholarship to Berklee College of Music in Boston, where he studied with mandolinist John McGann. In 2008, his sophomore year, he joined Joy Kills Sorrow, a New England string band. He graduated in 2011, and in 2012 he won the National Mandolin Championship at the Walnut Valley Festival.
When Joy Kills Sorrow played its last show in 2014, Yonder Mountain String Band called. They had just parted ways with founding mandolinist Jeff Austin. Jolliff joined and toured with them through 2019, recording several albums. Around 2016 he started the Jacob Jolliff Band to play his own instrumentals and songs. He has also toured with Béla Fleck’s My Bluegrass Heart.
Playing style
Jolliff’s right hand is the engine. His picking is clean and even at high speeds, and he can run long lines of arpeggios without a stumble. He came up on bluegrass and jazz, and his solos mix fiddle-tune drive with jazz harmony and bebop phrasing.
His compositions are built for a virtuoso band, with tricky forms and room for improvisation. He also plays jazz standards on mandolin, a habit from his Berklee training.
Influences and legacy
Jolliff learned from his father and from John McGann at Berklee. He has played beside the members of Joy Kills Sorrow and Yonder Mountain String Band, and with Béla Fleck.
He followed Jeff Austin in Yonder Mountain. His Winfield title puts him in a line of champions that includes Chris Thile in 1993.
Signature tunes and songs
Lost Vera The Perils of Macramé Los Angeles County Breakdown.
Awards and honors
National Mandolin Championship, Walnut Valley Festival, Winfield, Kansas, first place (2012)
Watch and listen
Jolliff explains his right-hand technique for Tunefox. This is how he gets his speed and clarity.
What to learn from Jolliff
Do what Jolliff did at Berklee: spend ten minutes a day on the right hand alone. Play open strings and simple scales with a metronome, alternating down and up strokes, keeping your wrist loose and your pick angle the same. Raise the tempo a little at a time over weeks. Speed and clarity come from a hand that never wastes motion.
Sources
Jacob Jolliff, Passim Jacob Jolliff, Bluegrass Unlimited Jacob Jolliff Band news, Bluegrass Today Jacob Jolliff, D’Addario The Jacob Jolliff Band, Purple Fiddle Song of the String: Jacob Jolliff’s new mandolin frontiers, WMOT Walnut Valley Festival winners archive, alphabetical (PDF)
Related players
See the mandolin players hub and the mandolin guide. Jolliff followed Jeff Austin in Yonder Mountain String Band. Chris Thile also won at Winfield. Dominick Leslie came up through Berklee in the same years.