For more information on Art Ensemble of Chicago, visit Britannica.com.
Art Ensemble of Chicago
| Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Art Ensemble of Chicago |
| Artist: The Art Ensemble of Chicago |
Group Members:
Famoudou Don Moye,
Malachi Favors,
Roscoe Mitchell,
Lester Bowie,
Joseph Jarman,
Phillip Wilson,
Elliot Ngubone
Similar Artists:
Influenced By:
Followers:
Performed Songs By:
Formal Connection With:
- Formed: 1966
- Genres: Jazz
- Representative Albums: "Bap-Tizum," "Live in Paris," "Live at Mandel Hall"
- Representative Songs: "Dreaming of the Masters," "Nonaah," "Odwalla"
Biography
Originally comprised of saxophonists Roscoe Mitchell and Joseph Jarman, trumpeter Lester Bowie, bassist Malachi Favors, and later, drummer Famoudou Don Moye, the Art Ensemble of Chicago enjoyed a critical reputation as the finest and most influential avant-garde jazz ensemble of the 1970s and '80s. Whether or not that reputation was wholly deserved is, in retrospect, subject to debate -- the World Saxophone Quartet and the Cecil Taylor Unit may well have been more influential. Nevertheless, the Art Ensemble was unquestionably a groundbreaking band. In the late '60s and early '70s, the Art Ensemble helped pioneer the fusion of jazz with European art music and indigenous African musics. It also fused jazz with itself; that is to say, the band combined elements of jazz history and pre-history -- for instance, music from the sanctified church services, minstrel shows, and bawdy houses of late 19th and early 20th century America -- with a modernist spirit of experimentation. A pronounced theatrical element was also essential to their work. Its members attained a measure of jazz stardom on their own -- particularly Bowie and, to a lesser extent, Mitchell -- but in the Art Ensemble, no single individual was greater than the whole. The band was an assortment of composers and improvisers of great individuality. Collectively, they created a compelling and unique entity.The group grew out of the Roscoe Mitchell Art Ensemble of the mid-'60s, which had in-turn grown out of Chicago pianist Muhal Richard Abrams' Experimental Band of the early-'60s. The latter was a rehearsal band, created for the purpose of playing scores written by many of the city's forward-thinking young African-American jazz composers. It attracted, among others, Mitchell, Jarman, and Favors. The two saxophonists had both served in the military, though not together; they met while students at Wilson Junior College. Favors had been an established member of the Chicago jazz scene since the '50s. All three were early members of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) a collective organized by Abrams and several like-minded fellow musicians. Lester Bowie moved to Chicago from St. Louis in 1966. Within days of arriving, he began rehearsing with Mitchell. In 1966, the Roscoe Mitchell Sextet (with Bowie and Favors) recorded Sound, the first album to come out of the AACM. In August 1967, Bowie recorded Numbers 1&2 for Delmark; on "2," the four musicians who would become the Art Ensemble recorded together for the first time. As the Roscoe Mitchell Art Ensemble, the band performed sans drummer for the next two years. In 1969 the band moved to Paris, where they met and hired "Sun Percussionist" Don Moye, who had come to Europe from Detroit with trumpeter Charles Moore's band. Renamed the Art Ensemble of Chicago, the group had a great deal of success in Europe, recording classic albums like Reese and the Smooth Ones (BYG) and People in Sorrow (Nessa). They moved back to Chicago in 1971; their 1972 homecoming concert was recorded and issued as Live at Mandel Hall (Delmark).
The band's renown grew in the '70s. In 1978 they formed their own label, AECO, which released solo recordings by Jarman, Moye, and Favors. The group recorded for ECM in the late '70s and early '80s, making a series of critically acclaimed albums, including Nice Guys, Full Force, Urban Bushmen, and The Third Decade. The band won a series of critic's polls and was considered by many to be the finest jazz ensemble in the world. In the latter half of the '80s, a general decline in critical enthusiasm for the avant-garde resulted in less attention being paid to bands like the Art Ensemble. Side projects by individual band members also seem to have had an effect on the band's vitality. Still, it continued to exist, concertizing and recording through the '90s, occasionally with guests and supplementary musicians. Jarman left the band in 1993 in order to devote himself full-time to spiritual matters. The band continued as a quartet. Bowie was stricken with liver cancer; for the band's June 1999 concert at the Boston Globe Jazz and Blues Festival, he was replaced by saxophonist Ari Brown. Bowie died in November of 1999. For its first concert following Bowie's death, a January 2000 date at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, the Art Ensemble performed as a trio. Although its remaining members were still capable of creating at a very high level, by the turn of the millennium the Art Ensemble's future seemed in doubt. ~ Chris Kelsey, All Music Guide
| Discography: The Art Ensemble of Chicago |
Show More Albums
Show Fewer Albums
| Wikipedia: Art Ensemble of Chicago |
The Art Ensemble of Chicago is an avant-garde jazz ensemble that grew out of Chicago's AACM in the late 1960s. The group continues to tour and record through 2006, despite the deaths of two of the founding members.
The Art Ensemble is notable for its integration of musical styles spanning jazz's entire history and for their multi-instrumentalism, especially the use of what they termed "little instruments" in addition to the traditional jazz lineup; "little instruments" can include bicycle horns, bells, birthday party noisemakers, wind chimes, and a vast array of percussion instruments (including found objects). The group also uses costumes and face paint in performance. These characteristics combine to make the ensemble's performances as much a visual spectacle as an aural one, with each musician playing from behind a large array of drums, bells, gongs, and other instruments. When playing in Europe in 1969, the group was using more than 500 instruments. [1]
Contents |
History
Members of what was to become the Art Ensemble performed together under various band names in the mid-sixties, releasing their first album, Sound, as the Roscoe Mitchell Sextet in 1966. The Sextet included saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell, trumpeter Lester Bowie and bassist Malachi Favors Maghostut, who over the next year went on to play together as the Roscoe Mitchell Art Ensemble. In 1967 they were joined by fellow AACM members Joseph Jarman (saxophone) and Phillip Wilson (drums), and made a number of recordings for Nessa.
As noted above, the musicians were all active multi-instrumentalists: Jarman and Mitchell's primary instruments were alto and tenor saxes, respectively, but they played many other saxophones (ranging from the tiny sopranino to the large bass), flutes and clarinets. In addition to trumpet, Bowie played flugelhorn, cornet, shofar and conch shells. Favors added touches of banjo and bass guitar. Over the years, most of the musicians dabbled on piano, synthesizer and other keyboards.
In 1969, Wilson left the group to join blues singer/harmonica player Paul Butterfield's band. That same year, the remaining group travelled to Paris [2], where they became known as the Art Ensemble of Chicago. The immediate impetus for the name change came from a French promoter who added "of Chicago" to their name for purely descriptive purposes, but the new name stuck because band members felt that it better reflected the cooperative nature of the group. In Paris the ensemble were based at the Théâtre des Vieux Colombier [3] and their distinctive music with percussion roles dispersed throughout the quartet was documented in a range of records on the Freedom and BYG labels. They also recorded "Comme à la radio" with Brigitte Fontaine and Areski Belkacem as a drummerless quartet before welcoming percussionist Famoudou Don Moye to the group in 1970.
In 1970 the ensemble recorded Art Ensemble of Chicago with Fontella Bass and Les Stances a Sophie with singer Fontella Bass, then Lester Bowie's wife. The latter was the soundtrack from the French movie of the same title. Bass' vocals, backed by the powerful pulsating push of the band has allowed the "Theme De YoYo" to remain an underground cult classic ever since.
The ensemble returned to the United States in 1972, and the quintet of Mitchell, Jarman, Bowie, Favors and Moye remained static until 1993. Upon their return to the States, they came to prominence with two major releases on Atlantic Records: Bap-Tizum and Fanfare for the Warriors. Members of the group made the decision to restrict their appearances together, allowing each player to pursue other musical interests. It seems likely that this has contributed to the longevity of the ensemble. Despite the self-imposed limitations the Art Ensemble managed to release more than 20 studio recordings and several live albums between 1972 and 2004.
The makeup of the ensemble changed in 1993, when Jarman retired from the group to focus on his practice of Zen and Aikido. Bowie died of liver cancer in 1999, and the group continued as a trio (featuring a number of guest artists in their performances) until 2003, when Jarman rejoined the ensemble. In January 2004 Favors Maghostut died suddenly during the recording of Sirius Calling. The group was joined in late 2004 by trumpeter Corey Wilkes and bassist Jaribu Shahid, who recorded the 2 CD live release Non-Cognitive Aspects of the City (2006) on Pi Recordings.
Ensemble members embrace the performance art aspects of their concerts, believing that they allow the band to move beyond the strict limits of "jazz". Their operating motto is "Great Black Music: Ancient To the Future", which allows them to explore a wide variety of musical styles and influences; the band's distinctive appearance on stage also reflects this motto. As Jarman describes it,
- So what we were doing with that face painting was representing everyone throughout the universe, and that was expressed in the music as well. That's why the music was so interesting. It wasn't limited to Western instruments, African instruments, or Asian instruments, or South American instruments, or anybody's instruments. [4]
Discography
Further reading
- Lewis, George. A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music. University of Chicago Press, 2008.
- Shipton, Alyn. A New History of Jazz. London: Continuum, 2001.
Films
- 1982 - Live From the Jazz Showcase: The Art Ensemble of Chicago (directed by William J Mahin, the University of Illinois at Chicago). Filmed at Joe Segal's Jazz Showcase in Chicago, November 1, 1981.
References
- ^ Jost, Ekkehard (1975). Free Jazz (Studies in Jazz Research 4). Universal Edition. pp. 177.
- ^ Wilmer, Valerie (1977). As Serious As Your Life: The Story of the New Jazz. Quartet. pp. 122–123.
- ^ Jost, Ekkehard (1975). Free Jazz (Studies in Jazz Research 4). Universal Edition. pp. 167.
- ^ Joseph Jarman interview
External links
- Art Ensemble of Chicago website. http://www.artensembleofchicago.com/ Retrieved January 11, 2005.
- Art Ensemble of Chicago discography. http://www.geocities.com/BourbonStreet/Delta/8835/art.html Retrieved January 11, 2005.
- Art Ensemble of Chicago biography on the AACM website]. http://aacmchicago.org/groups/AECO.html Retrieved January 11, 2005.
- Sanders, Seth (April 29, 2004). 'After 32 years, Art Ensemble of Chicago returns to Mandel Hall to play its "great black music, ancient to future"'. University of Chicago Chronical. http://chronicle.uchicago.edu/040429/artensemble.shtml Retrieved January 11, 2005.
- Joseph Jarman interview. http://www.furious.com/perfect/jarman.html Retrieved January 11, 2005.
- Photos: The Art Ensemble of Chicago live 2006 in Salzburg/Austria: http://kairos.biz/j/artensembleofchicago.html.
- Portraits of The Art Ensemble of Chicago by Dominik Huber / dominikphoto.com: http://dominikphoto.com/gallery2/main.php?g2_itemId=1141/j/artensembleofchicago.html.
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
Learn More
 | Works (1980 Album by Lester Bowie) |
| Heiner Stadler (Jazz Artist, '60s-'80s) |
| The Art Ensemble of Chicago: Live from the Jazz Showcase (1981 Music Film) |
Help us answer these
 | What is Art Institute of Chicago tuition? |
| What is the Best art gallery in Chicago? |
| What is showing at the Art institue of Chicago? |
Post a question - any question - to the WikiAnswers community:
Copyrights:
 |
 | Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved. Read more |
 |
| Artist. Copyright © 2009 All Media Guide, LLC. Content provided by All Music Guide ®, a trademark of All Media Guide, LLC. All rights reserved. Read more |
 |
| Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Art Ensemble of Chicago". Read more |
Related answers
- When is the Art Institute of Chicago open?
- Where is the The Art Institute of Chicago located?
- What is an ensemble?
- What is an ensembles?
ADVERTISEMENT
Answer these
- Art Ensemble Of Chicago go home?
- How do you sell art in chicago illinois?
- Is there a school for creative arts in Chicago?
Mentioned in
- Works (1980 Album by Lester Bowie)
- Heiner Stadler (Jazz Artist, '60s-'80s)
- The Art Ensemble of Chicago: Live from the Jazz Showcase (1981 Music Film)
- The Art Ensemble of Chicago (Dance Film)
- Rarum, Vol. 6: Selected Recordings (2002 Album by The Art Ensemble of Chicago)
- Chuck Nessa (Jazz Artist, '60s-2000s)
- Non-Cognitive Aspects of the City: Live at Iridium (2006 Album by The Art Ensemble of Chicago)
- Fanfare for the Warriors (1973 Album by The Art Ensemble of Chicago)
- Song of Singing (1970 Album by Chick Corea)
- Trad (1996 Album by Spaceways)
- Song of Singing [Japan] (2004 Album by Chick Corea)
- Ntu: The Point from Which Freedom Begins (1971 Album by Oliver Lake)
- Live from the Jazz Showcase [Video] (1995 Album by The Art Ensemble of Chicago)
- The Flow of Things (1986 Album by Roscoe Mitchell Quartet)
