(Electric bass, piano, 1951–87) The brash Pennsylvania native burst on to the music scene in 1974 with a debut recording, Jaco, which redefined the way in which the electric bass could be played. A veteran of R&B and pop bands in Fort Lauderdale by the age of 24, Pastorius collaborated with his good friend, guitarist ...
(Ya’-kob Ob’-rekht) c. 1450–1505 Franco-Flemish composer Obrecht, who has long lived in the shadow of his more famous contemporary Josquin, may begin to receive the attention he deserves now that changes in Josquin’s biography show that many of the musical developments once attributed to him first appeared in Obrecht’s music. Innovator or not, Obrecht was a composer of considerable ...
(Yo’-han Ya’-kop Fro’-bâr-ger) 1616–67 German composer Johann Jacob Froberger was the most important German harpsichord composer of the first half of the seventeenth century. In about 1637, he was appointed as imperial court organist at Vienna, and there he benefited from a sympathetic patron in Emperor Ferdinand III, who was himself a gifted musician. Soon after his appointment, Froberger ...
(Ya-ko-po Pa’-re) 1561–1633 Italian composer Peri was a Florentine who held a post as musician at the Medici court. He was probably a member of Bardi’s famous circle of Camerata in Florence, but by 1592 was enjoying the patronage of the amateur composer Corsi. One of the poets of Corsi’s household was Rinuccini, whose pastoral poem Dafne was partly set ...
1561–1633, Italian Like his rival and fellow Roman Giulio Caccini, Jacopo Peri possessed several musical talents. He was a composer, singer and harpist. In 1588, also like Caccini, Peri joined the Medici court in Florence. At age 27, he was, it seems, an attractive addition to one of the most glittering courts in ...
John McLaughlin (b. 1942) led the Mahavishnu Orchestra and a series of other bands that stretched the boundaries of jazz-rock fusion and world music, as he inspired guitarists worldwide with his inventiveness and devotion to exotic sounds and spirituality. McLaughlin started on guitar when he was 11 and was initially inspired by blues and swing players. McLaughlin worked with Alexis ...
Joni Mitchell (b. 1943) evolved from a traditional folk singer in the 1960s to a world-class singer, composer and innovator whose unique guitar tunings and jazz explorations in the 1970s and 1980s are still widely influential. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in Canada. In 1965, she moved to the United States and began touring. Some of her original ...
Mike Stern (b. 1953), the American jazz guitarist, emerged as a major force in the jazz guitar scene through his work with Miles Davis’ band in the early Eighties, Stern has played with stars such as Stan Getz, Jaco Pastorius, Pat Martino and David Sanborn. Stern was also a guitarist in Steps Ahead and the Brecker Brothers ...
(Instrumental group, 1971–present) The antithesis of the fusion music of the 1970s, Oregon comprised Paul McCandless (oboe, English horn, tenor saxophone, bass clarinet), Glen Moore (bass, violin, piano, flute), Ralph Towner (guitar, piano, French horn, trumpet, flugelhorn) and Colin Walcott (tabla, sitar, clarinet, percussion). In some ...
Guitarist Pat Metheny emerged in the mid-1970s with a fully realized approach to his instrument that was wholly unique for its time, offering a refreshing alternative to both bop and fusion styles. His sweeping, warm-toned, reverb-soaked lines and liquid phrasing, once described by Down Beat magazine as ‘the sound of wind through the trees’, had a huge ...
(Piano, synthesizer, b. 1932) Paul Bley came from Montreal to New York in the early 1950s and worked with Jackie McLean. Later, in Los Angeles, he pioneered free jazz with Ornette Coleman. Throughout his career Bley has performed the compositions of his ex-wives – keyboardist Carla Bley and singer/pianist Annette Peacock – and his own pieces, ...
‘Fusion’ can be applied to any music that blends two or more different styles, though it is normally used to describe the electronic jazz rock movement that emerged in the late 1960s. Some of the musicians expanded the boundaries of both jazz and rock, while others focused on producing sophisticated, but shallow, ‘background’ music. Although fusion records ...
Of the entire century, the 1970s were the years of catching one’s breath. Superficially, the promise of the 1960s had faded or failed, the victim of wretched excess and just plain bad taste. America’s war in Vietnam sputtered to an end, international relations elsewhere seemed to stalemate in détente and economically the world suffered from stagflation: exhaustion ...
As the end of the twentieth century approached, the United States – its culture included – entered a rare period of recapitulation, retrieval and, ultimately, renewal. The election as President of ageing Ronald Reagan, ex-movie star and California governor, introduced unexpected neo-conservatism, an ideology that looked back to a rosy, though mythical, ...
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An extensive music information resource, bringing together the talents and expertise of a wide range of editors and musicologists, including Stanley Sadie, Charles Wilson, Paul Du Noyer, Tony Byworth, Bob Allen, Howard Mandel, Cliff Douse, William Schafer, John Wilson...
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Classical, Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and more. Flame Tree has been making encyclopaedias and guides about music for over 20 years. Now Flame Tree Pro brings together a huge canon of carefully curated information on genres, styles, artists and instruments. It's a perfect tool for study, and entertaining too, a great companion to our music books.
David Bowie
Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers
his life, music, art and movies, with a
sweep of incredible photographs.