John Zorn is an American composer, arranger, record producer, saxophonist, and multi-instrumentalist with hundreds of album credits as performer, composer, and producer across a variety of genres including jazz, rock, hardcore, classical, surf, metal, soundtrack, ambient, and improvised music. He incorporates diverse styles in his compositions, which he identifies as avant-garde or experimental. Zorn was described by Down Beat as "one of our most important composers".
The Book of Heads (1978), composed by John Zorn, is a set of 35 etudes for solo guitar. It was recorded and released in 1995, and featured Marc Ribot. The pieces use multiple extended techniques.
The Circle Maker is a double album by John Zorn featuring Zorn's Masada compositions performed by the Masada String Trio and the Bar Kokhba Sextet which was released in 1998 on the Tzadik label.
IAO is an album by John Zorn released in 2002 on the Tzadik label. The album was inspired by Aleister Crowley and his follower, filmmaker Kenneth Anger and draws its title from the Kabbalistic identity of IAO, the initials of Isis, Apophis and Osiris, used as a magical formula in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and in Aleister Crowley's Gnostic Mass.
Taboo & Exile is an album by John Zorn. It is the second album to appear in Zorn's Music Romance Series following Music for Children (1998). Three of the tracks on this recording are from Zorn's Masada songbook.
Music for Children is the first release in John Zorn's Music Romance Series and features three Naked City compositions performed by Zorn with the band Prelapse; a 20-minute composition for wind machines and controlled feedback systems dedicated to Edgar Varese, and a classical chamber music piece for violin, percussion and piano performed by the Abel-Steinberg-Winant Trio framed by a poly-rhythmic etude for percussion and celeste and a lullaby for music box.
'From Silence to Sorcery' is an album of contemporary classical music by John Zorn which features three instrumental works touching upon themes of magic and mysticism. "Goetia" is a set of variations for solo violin written in 2002. "Gris-Gris" (2000) is a work for thirteen tuned drums performed by William Winant inspired by the music of Korean Shamanism, Haitian Voodoo and a scene from Howard Hawks’ classic film To Have and Have Not. Scored for clavichord, three muted strings and percussion, 'Shibboleth" (1997) is a tribute to the Jewish poet Paul Celan.
Pool is an album by John Zorn featuring his early "game piece" composition of the same name which was first released on vinyl on Parachute Records in 1980 as a double album including the composition "Hockey". The album was released on CD on Tzadik Records with an additional bonus track featuring a test recording of Archery as part of The Parachute Years Box Set in 1997 and as a single CD in 2000. The album was the first released solely under Zorn's name following his collaboration with Eugene Chadbourne, School (1978).
The Classic Guide to Strategy is a compilation album by John Zorn featuring his two early solo records The Classic Guide to Strategy Volume One (1983), (tracks 1-2) and the Classic Guide to Strategy Volume Two (1986), (tracks 3-8). The albums were first released on vinyl on Lumina Records in and later re-released on Tzadik Records in 1996 as a single CD. The second track is inspired by the work of Carl Stalling and tracks 3-8 are named after avant-garde Japanese artists. The Classic Guide to Strategy Volume Two also contained the track "Yano Akiko" (5:20) which does not appear on the CD re-release.
Godard/Spillane is a compilation album by American composer and saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist John Zorn consisting of music created through Zorn's file-card compositional process. The composition "Godard", a tribute to French film-maker Jean-Luc Godard whose jump-cut technique inspired Zorn's compositional approach, on the French tribute album Jean-Luc Godard|Godard ça vous chante? in 1986 issued by the French Nato label. "Spillane" was first released on Zorn's Nonesuch Records album Spillane in 1987, and "Blues Noël" was first released on the compilation album Joyeux Noël - Merry Christmas Everybody! on Nato in 1987.
Filmworks IV: S/M + More features film scores by John Zorn. The album was released in Japan on Eva Records in 1996 and on Zorn's own label, Tzadik Records, in 1997. It features the music that Zorn wrote and recorded for Maria Beatty's The Elegant Spanking, Beatty and M.M. Serra's A Lot of Fun for the Evil One, "Credits Included" written for the film of the same name directed by Jalal Toufic and "Maogai," written for a piano scene in a film by Hiroki Ryuichi.
Filmworks VI: 1996 features three scores for film by John Zorn. The album was released on Zorn's own label, Tzadik Records, in 1996. It features the music that Zorn wrote and recorded for Anton, Mailman (1996), a short film directed by Dina Waxman that was never completed due to loss of funding in its final stages, Mechanics of the Brain (1996) directed by Henry Hills and The Black Glove (1996), which was directed by, and starred, Maria Beatty.
New Traditions in East Asian Bar Bands is an album by American composer and saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist John Zorn consisting of improvised music from paired instruments and narration in Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese. The pieces are listed individually within Zorn's game pieces and were composed in 1986, 1988 and 1990 respectively.
Redbird is an album of contemporary classical music by American composer and saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist John Zorn consisting of two tribute compositions for artist Agnes Martin.
Angelus Novus is an album of contemporary classical music by American composer and alto saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist John Zorn including compositions written in 1972 ("Christabel"), and 1983.
Cartoon/S&M is a double album of contemporary classical music by American composer John Zorn. The piece Kol Nidre which appears in two versions on this recording is a tune from Zorn's Masada songbook.
Madness, Love and Mysticism is an album of contemporary classical music by American composer John Zorn released in 2001 on the Tzadik label.
Chimeras is an album of contemporary classical music by American composer John Zorn featuring a 12 part piece inspired by Arnold Schoenberg's atonal composition "Pierrot Lunaire". In 2010 the album was revised and re-recorded, with an additional "Postlude".
Theater of Minreral NADEs is an album by violinist/multi-instrumentalist Eyvind Kang which was released in 1998 on John Zorn's Tzadik Records as part of the Composer Series.
7 NADEs is the debut album by violinist/multi-instrumentalist Eyvind Kang which was released in 1996 on John Zorn's Tzadik Records as part of the Composer Series.
