Novus Records | |
---|---|
Parent company | Arista Records |
Founded | 1978 |
Founder | Clive Davis |
Status | Defunct |
Genre | Jazz |
Country of origin | U.S. |
Novus Records (later Arista Novus and RCA Novus) was an American jazz record label run by Steve Backer. Backer worked at Impulse! Records until 1974, when Clive Davis, founder of Arista Records, asked him to oversee the jazz division at Arista. [1]
Backer left Arista in the early 1980s, worked for Windham Hill Records, and then went to RCA to run Novus. [1] Novus's roster included Muhal Richard Abrams, Warren Bernhardt, Steve Coleman, Larry Coryell, Oliver Lake, Steve Lacy, James Moody, Hilton Ruiz, and Henry Threadgill. Beginning in 1989, Backer signed Marcus Roberts, Roy Hargrove, Danilo Pérez, Antonio Hart, and Christopher Hollyday. The label closed in the mid-1990s. [2] [3] The catalogue is now managed by Sony Masterworks through its Masterworks Jazz imprint.
Henry Threadgill is an American composer, saxophonist and flautist. He came to prominence in the 1970s leading ensembles rooted in jazz but with unusual instrumentation and often incorporating other genres of music. He has performed and recorded with several ensembles: Air, Aggregation Orb, Make a Move, the seven-piece Henry Threadgill Sextett, the twenty-piece Society Situation Dance Band, Very Very Circus, X-75, and Zooid.
Muhal Richard Abrams was an American educator, administrator, composer, arranger, clarinetist, cellist, and jazz pianist in the free jazz medium. He recorded and toured the United States, Canada and Europe with his orchestra, sextet, quartet, duo, and as a solo pianist.
The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) is a nonprofit organization, founded in 1965 in Chicago by pianist Muhal Richard Abrams, pianist Jodie Christian, drummer Steve McCall, and composer Phil Cohran. The AACM is devoted "to nurturing, performing, and recording serious, original music," according to its charter. It supports and encourages jazz performers, composers and educators. Although founded in the jazz tradition, the group's outreach and influence has, according to Larry Blumenfeld, "touched nearly all corners of modern music."
Craig S. Harris is an American jazz trombonist, who started working with Sun Ra in 1976. He also has worked with Abdullah Ibrahim, David Murray, Lester Bowie, Cecil Taylor, Sam Rivers, Muhal Richard Abrams, and Charlie Haden. He has recorded since 1983 as leader for India Navigation, Soul Note and JMT. For the latter he recorded with two groups. The Tailgater's Tales was a quintet with clarinetist Don Byron, trumpeter Eddie Allen, Anthony Cox on double bass, and Pheeroan akLaff on drums. His large ensemble Cold Sweat was a tribute to the music of James Brown.
Larry Coryell was an American jazz guitarist, widely considered the "godfather of fusion". Alongside Gábor Szabó, he was a pioneer in melding jazz, country and rock music. Coryell was also a music teacher and a writer, penning a monthly column for Guitar Player magazine from 1977 to 1989. He made a number of collaborations with other high-profile musicians, a list that included John McLaughlin, Chick Corea, Miroslav Vitouš, Billy Cobham, Lenny White, Al Di Meola, Paco de Lucía, Steve Morse and others.
Pi Recordings is a jazz record label founded by Seth Rosner in 2001. He was soon joined as partner by Yulun Wang. Pi specializes in avant-garde jazz. Its first two albums were by Henry Threadgill.
Fred Hopkins was an American double bassist who played a major role in the development of the avant-garde jazz movement. He was best known for his association with the trio Air with Henry Threadgill and Steve McCall, and for his numerous performances and extensive recordings with major jazz musicians such as Muhal Richard Abrams, Arthur Blythe, Oliver Lake, and David Murray. He was a member of the AACM, and a frequent participant in the loft jazz scene of the 1970s. He also co-led a number of albums with the composer and cellist Diedre Murray. Gary Giddins wrote that Hopkins' playing "fused audacious power with mercuric reflexes." Howard Reich, writing in the Chicago Tribune, stated that "many connoisseurs considered [Hopkins] the most accomplished jazz bassist of his generation" and praised him for "the extraordinarily fluid technique, sumptuous tone and innovative methods he brought to his instrument."
Douglas R. Ewart is a Jamaican multi-instrumentalist and instrument builder. He plays sopranino and alto saxophones, clarinets, bassoon, flute, bamboo flutes, and didgeridoo; as well as Rastafarian hand drums.
Warren Bernhardt was an American pianist in jazz, pop and classical music.
Jean-Paul Etienne Bourelly is an American guitarist whose music crosses the boundaries of jazz fusion and rock.
Steve McCall was an American jazz drummer.
Baikida Carroll is an American jazz trumpeter.
Spiral Live at Montreux 1978 is a live album by Muhal Richard Abrams recorded at the Montreux Jazz Festival and released on the Arista Novus label in 1978.
James Emery is an American jazz guitarist. He grew up in Willoughby, Ohio and Shaker Heights, Ohio. Emery plays archtop guitar, semi-acoustic guitar, electric guitar, and soprano guitar.
This is a timeline documenting events of Jazz in the year 1989.
This is a timeline documenting events of Jazz in the year 1995.
In the 1980s in jazz, the jazz community shrank dramatically and split. A mainly older audience retained an interest in traditional and straight-ahead jazz styles. Wynton Marsalis strove to create music within what he believed was the tradition, creating extensions of small and large forms initially pioneered by such artists as Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington. In the early 1980s, a commercial form of jazz fusion called pop fusion or "smooth jazz" became successful and garnered significant radio airplay. Smooth jazz saxophonists include Grover Washington Jr., Kenny G, Kirk Whalum, Boney James, and David Sanborn. Smooth jazz received frequent airplay with more straight-ahead jazz in "quiet storm" time slots at radio stations in urban markets across the U.S., helping to establish or bolster the careers of vocalists including Al Jarreau, Anita Baker, Chaka Khan, and Sade. In this same time period Chaka Khan released Echoes of an Era, which featured Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke, and Lenny White. She also released the song "And the Melody Still Lingers On " with Dizzy Gillespie reviving the solo break from "Night in Tunisia".
In the 1990s in jazz, jazz rap continued progressing from the late 1980s and early 1990s, and incorporated jazz influence into hip hop. In 1988, Gang Starr released the debut single "Words I Manifest", sampling Dizzy Gillespie's 1962 "A Night in Tunisia", and Stetsasonic released "Talkin' All That Jazz", sampling Lonnie Liston Smith. Gang Starr's debut LP, No More Mr. Nice Guy, and their track "Jazz Thing" for the soundtrack of Mo' Better Blues, sampling Charlie Parker and Ramsey Lewis. Gang Starr also collaborated with Branford Marsalis and Terence Blanchard. Groups making up the collective known as the Native Tongues Posse tended towards jazzy releases; these include the Jungle Brothers' debut Straight Out the Jungle and A Tribe Called Quest's People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm and The Low End Theory.
Mark Thomas Taylor is an American jazz French horn player.
Reginald "Reggie" Nicholson is an American jazz drummer.