STEVE DIGIORGIO Remembers How CHUCK SCHULDINER Pushed His Bandmates To Greatness: “There Were No Margins, He Was A Try-Anything Kind Of Guy”

In a recent interview with D’Addario And Co., veteran metal bassist Steve DiGiorgio reflected on his time playing with the late Chuck Schuldiner, the mastermind behind Death, during the 1990s.

He described Schuldiner as both a leader and an encourager, someone who set the foundation for songs while allowing his bandmates to bring their own creativity to the table.

“Working with Chuck, he established the song with his riff, and he would allow the players around him to take that and interpret it as they saw fit, as long as he still had that direction that he set out,” DiGiorgio explained (via Blabbermouth).

“He really pushed the players to add to that stuff. There were even times where I would write something a little counterpoint, something going crazy, and I’m thinking, like, ‘Oh, he’s gonna hear this and he’s probably gonna want to tame it down because it’s a little brave.’,” DiGiorgio recalled. “And he would just shake his head. And he’d be, like, ‘Man, I know you could do more. I like your idea, but come on — go for it.’ So he was a big factor for me to go for it. He was a try-anything kind of guy.”

Despite Schuldiner’s strong vision, DiGiorgio pushed back against the long-standing perception that he was difficult in the studio: “In the old days, people would say, ‘Is he a tyrant in the studio?’ I’m, like, ‘Man, are you kidding? This guy is the most open-minded free thinker.’”

“And there were times where your ideas steered a little bit away from what he was looking for and he would rein you in and say, ‘Can you save that for over here? Because maybe I have a harmony part that comes on. I don’t want it to clash.’ He wasn’t just letting everything fly — it was a good quality control — but he had enough confidence in his own composition ability that he could allow players to be themselves, bring their personality in, and decorate his riffs.”

“And it’s still his composition, it’s still Death, and more people enjoy it because now the drumming world is interested in this band, bass players are interested in this band. So he welcomed this kind of activity because it just drew people in. And then you see the catalog. It’s this iconic band with brutal death metal with musicality in it.”

Schuldiner’s influences stretched far beyond traditional death metal. According to DiGiorgio, he was deeply inspired by power metal and classic metal vocalists, which helped shape Death’s evolving sound.

“He came from a very brutal background, so the early stuff has this guttural, demonic vibe, but his interests were in power metal, classic metal, melodic singing — Bruce Dickinson, Rob Halford, King Diamond. That was always trickling in and influencing his evolution as a writer. These really major progressions and happy notes are getting thrown in in a brutal context.”

“There’s this hybrid in there, and I think that set him apart because he didn’t have this really narrow margin of, ‘This is death metal.’ There were no margins. If it sounded a little happy, that’s good. Well, maybe the next part will get dark again and we’d go back and forth, and I think that gives Death its distinct character — this kind of willingness to just break genres and let stuff seep in as it may,” DiGiorgio added.

More than a decade after Schuldiner’s passing, DiGiorgio continues to honor his legacy by touring with Death To All (DTA), a band composed of former Death members dedicated to keeping his music alive.