Though Ryan Bisio came to CSUMB as a basketball player, the self-described “prolonged senior” will leave the school next fall as an accomplished singer/songwriter. Bisio, looking the part in a frayed corduroy jacket and a gray cap at a table outside of Monterey’s Morgan’s Coffee & Tea, tells me about his transition from all-state basketball star attending school on a sports scholarship to musician with one self-produced CD under his belt and another on the way.

Before attending CSUMB, Bisio’s first foray into music was playing Dave Matthews and Beatles’ covers at Santa Rosa coffee shops. Bisio admits that moving to Monterey to attend college inspired him to start creating his own compositions. “I didn’t write any songs until I came to Monterey,” he says.

Bisio believes that two experiences spurred him to write his own numbers. One was hearing quirky songwriter Tom Waits for the first time in 2003. “His music gave me courage to put myself out there,” he says. “He just kicked a door open in my head that I don’t think will ever be shut.”

Another was witnessing a fatal motorcycle accident from the balcony of his Monterey apartment. That incident inspired him to write his first original tune, the downbeat “Backward Letters.”

A couple years later, Bisio released his first CD, the 14-song Sketches, which was self-produced and recorded in his apartment.

Now Bisio is working on his sophomore album, Big Face Invitation, which he expects to release next fall or winter. “It’s got a fuller sound,” he says. “It’s me exploring my percussive side, and it’s me writing better songs.”