Colin Botts was born February 21, 1976, to parents who had recently graduated from BYU. Dad donated blood to help pay for the delivery at the University of California San Francisco Medical Center where mom received prenatal care and Colin was delivered.
His first home was a walk-in closet in a 5th floor studio apartment on the corner of Gough and Jackson in San Francisco's Pacific Heights. The studio was sunny and pleasant but even on rainy days provided hours of entertainment as cars slipped and spun their wheels trying to climb the steep hill outside.
Colin was on the go and went everywhere with his active mom. He did the first of many Sierras backpacking trips at 4 months of age. Mom carried him and the disposable diapers. Dad carried the rest. Later he would complete a 50-mile backpacking trip and another of 67 miles with Dad and fellow scouts.
Mom played violin in the community college orchestra and Colin went to all the rehearsals. This early exposure to music may have sparked Colin's interest in music, which continues to this day. So how does a classically trained piano student end up playing bass in the RubberBand? It all began with a drum. That's what the then nearly two-year old asked Santa to bring in 1977. He beat on that until mom signed him up for violin lessons at age 8. About the same time his family bought an old upright piano and Colin began learning to play that as well. He could hardly walk by the piano without sitting down and playing for a few minutes.
His introduction to the bass came at the end of sixth grade when Ryan Kaiser, his middle school orchestra teacher asked him to take home a bass for the summer and learn to play it, so he could support the jazz band the next school year. Learn it he did. When he finished middle school, two years later, he was given the "Outstanding Musician" award.
His family began a long-term friendship with an artsy family in Carmel who owns a quaint cottage about 3 blocks from the beach. Three or four times a year they would rent the cottage for a few days and relax in Carmel. Colin would jam in the "garage" with Herb Eggleston, Rushad Eggleston (of Fiddlers Four), and his brother, Nate.
Although not a priority at first, bass became his primary instrument while at College Park High. He attended jazz festivals with the jazz band and often received special recognition for his bass playing. He played bass in various other bands, including his own, a jazz quartet, which performed at the San Mateo Dixieland Jazz Festival. He also played percussion in the symphonic band throughout high school.
When he was a senior Colin was selected by his classmates and band director to receive the Louis Armstrong Jazz Award. He had become quite an accomplished bass player. He also provided the prelude and postlude music on the piano for graduation during his sophomore and junior years and played the solo musical number at his own commencement exercises.
In 1994, Colin was accepted into the Brigham Young University music school and awarded a scholarship to study bass. He performed with various BYU groups in the jazz program and has also toured extensively for three years around the world with the BYU Young Ambassadors to South Africa, Swaziland, Botswana, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Taiwan, Japan, Canada, Russia and throughout the United States.
More recently he has also done studio work for various Utah artists on both string bass and bass guitar.
Although bass will always be his true love and main instrument Colin has undertaken the task of learning a number of other instruments including banjo, guitar, and accordion. If it's got strings he can probably play it.
In addition to his music interests Colin is an avid telemark skier and rock climber. This past summer he worked with troubled teens in a wilderness adventure program. He has lived in Buenos Aires, Argentina for two years while serving a mission for the LDS church and grew to love the Milonga music of the gaucho and the soulful tango music.
Colin Botts is an accomplished musician and bass player. In reviewing one performance, a writer for MTV described him in part like this, "...the highlight of the band had to be the bassist. He not only provided the driving force behind (the) music, but he was versatile in doing it. He would definitely have to be ranked among Utah's top bassists."
Currently Colin's instruments are a 5-string Musicman Sting Ray, a Fender Jazz Bass, and an old German flat-back upright that his dad traded for a pizza.
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