John Zorn was born in New York city in 1953. Zorn played a variety
of instruments before studying saxophone and composition at Webster College
in St. Louis in the early 1970's. He is founding member and saxophonist
of the group "Naked City" and composed all of the works the ensemble performed.
Zorn has written film scores and cartoon soundtracks, and has composed
several works for a variety of instrumentation. Zorn continues to collaborate
with acclaimed musicians and is considered a master of making use of a
recording studio as a compositional tool. Many of Zorn's compositions exist
only in their recorded renditions, which are assembled "moment by moment"
in the studio. For six months each year he lives in Tokyo, absorbing a
culture he admires for its ability to borrow and mirror other cultures.
Zorn tours and performs with his group and with other collaborators in
many cities throughout the United States, Japan and Europe.
Over the last several years, Zorn has developed a compositional method
in which he jots down diverse ideas and images - musical "moments" - on
filing cards, which are then sorted and ordered to provide the composition's
structure. Zorn's method of composition has been influenced by cartoon
soundtracks and their composers, particularly Carl Stalling (of the Warner
Brothers cartoons), whom Zorn equates with Stravinsky for the ability to
compose a piece from disparate musical elements. Speed, the increasing
rate at which the world changes, is a critical concern via the pace at
which his musical "moments" give way to or collide with one another. Marked
at first by his own remarkably versatile alto saxophone. Zorn's music over
the last decade has incorporated other instruments, uncoventional sounds,
and musical "information" from around the globe. From the example of Duke
Ellington, Zorn thinks of the musicians who play works as essential collaborators
in his compositions.
"Kaleidoscopic" has been used to describe his approach to composing,
because his pieces present a quick-changing array of disparate sound elements.
Readily admitting he has a short attention span. Zorn contructs his music
to reflect a mercurial fascination with the fast- paced flow of information.
Overall, the individualistic efforts of the performers are essential to
the success of each piece, as their personalities become discrete musical
elements like chords, meters, or themes, to be orchestrated by the composer.
Trained in classical composition, initial inspirations being the American
composer-inventors Charles Ives, John Cage and Harry Partch. He developed
an interest in jazz when he attended a concert given by trumpeter Jacques
Coursil, who was teaching him French at the time. His later jazz idols
have included Anthony Braxton, Ornette Coleman, Jimmy Giuffre and Roscoe
Mitchell.
Since 1974 he has been active on New York's Lower East Side, a leading
representative of the "downtown" avant garde, applying "game theory" to
structure free improvisational parallel technique to Butch Morris' condition.
Zorn's keen study of bebop and his razorsharp alto saxophone technique
gained him respect from the jazz players: in 1977 he and guitarist Eugene
Chadbourne were included in an 11-piece ensemble playing Frank Lowe's compositions
. A record collector, Zorn was inspired by Derek Bailey's Incus releases,
and in 1983 recorded Yankees with him and trombonist George Lewis.
The same year he wrote some music from Hal Willner's tribute to Thelonious
Monk album. That's the Way I feel now. In 1985 he contributed to Willner's
Kurt Weil album Lost in The Stars and made a commercial breakthrough
with The Big Gundown, which intepreted Ennio Morricone's themes by deploying
all kind of unlikely musicians (including Big John Patton and Toots Thielmans).
New for Lulu (1987) with Lewis and Bill Frisell, presented classic
hard bop tunes from the 60's with bebop venture, following Voodoo
by the Sonny Clark Memorial quartet (Zorn, Wayne Horvitz, Ray Drummond,
Bobby Previte). Declaring that hardcore rock music had the same intensity
as 60's free fazz, he championed Nottingham's Napalm Death and recorded
hardcore versions of Ornette Coleman's tunes on the provocative Spy
Vs Spy (1989). Naked City (Frisell -g- Fred Frith -b- Joey Baron -b-)
became his vehicle for skipping between slcaze jazz, surf rock and hardcore:
they made an impressive debut for Elektra/Nonesuch in 1990. In 1991 he
formed Pain Killer with bassist/producer Bill Laswell and Mick Harris (the
drummer from Napalm Death) and released Cuts of a Virgin on Earache, The
Nottingham hardcore label. He played at Company Week 1991, proving by his
commitment and enthusiasm that (relative) commercial success has not made
him turn his back on free improvisation. Zorn's genre transgression seems
set to become the commonsense of creative music in the 90's.
JOHN ZORN - ALBUMS:
School 1978
Pool 1980
Archery 1981
The Classic Guide to strategy volume one 1983
Locus Solus 1983
with Derek Bailca, George Lewis, Yankees 1983
with Jim Staley OTB 1984
with Michihiro Sato Ganryu
Island 1985
The Big Gundown 1985
The Classic Guide to Strategy vol. 2 1986
with the Sonny Clark Memorial Quartet Voodoo 1986
Cobra in 1987 rec 1985-86
News for Lulu 1987
Spillane 1988
Spy Vs Spy: The music of Ornette Coleman 1989
Naked City 1990, with Naked City
Torture Garden 1990, with Pain Killer
Guts of a Virgin 1991
More News for Lulu 1992 |
