Arthur Russell (cellist)
Encyclopedia
Charles Arthur Russell, Jr. (May 21, 1951 – April 4, 1992) was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 cellist, composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

, singer, and musician whose work spanned the genres of classical
Classical music
Classical music is the art music produced in, or rooted in, the traditions of Western liturgical and secular music, encompassing a broad period from roughly the 11th century to present times...

, disco
Disco
Disco is a genre of dance music. Disco acts charted high during the mid-1970s, and the genre's popularity peaked during the late 1970s. It had its roots in clubs that catered to African American, gay, psychedelic, and other communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and...

, experimental
Experimental music
Experimental music refers, in the English-language literature, to a compositional tradition which arose in the mid-20th century, applied particularly in North America to music composed in such a way that its outcome is unforeseeable. Its most famous and influential exponent was John Cage...

, folk
Folk music
Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....

 and rock
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

.

Although he found the most commercial success in the dance music genre, Russell's career bridged New York's downtown
Downtown music
Downtown music is a subdivision of American music, closely related to experimental music. The scene the term describes began in 1960, when Yoko Ono—one of the Fluxus artists, at that time still seven years away from meeting John Lennon—opened her loft at 112 Chambers Street to be used...

, rock, and dance music scenes. His collaborators included Philip Glass
Philip Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...

, David Byrne
David Byrne (musician)
David Byrne is a musician and artist, best known as a founding member and principal songwriter of the American new wave band Talking Heads, which was active between 1975 and 1991. Since then, Byrne has released his own solo recordings and worked with various media including film, photography,...

, and Nicky Siano
Nicky Siano
Nicky Siano was a resident DJ at Studio 54. Siano was born in Brooklyn, New York.In 1971 at the age of 16 he got his first djing gig, with the help of Robin Lord, and in 1972 he opened The Gallery in SoHo, Manhattan with his older brother Joe Siano. At the time he was considered to be the best DJ...

. Relatively unknown during his lifetime, a series of reissues, compilations, books and a biographical documentary have significantly raised his profile in the 2000s.

Life and career

Russell was born and raised in Oskaloosa, Iowa
Oskaloosa, Iowa
Oskaloosa is the county seat of Mahaska County, Iowa, United States. The population was 11,463 in the 2010 census, an increase from 10,938 in the 2000 census. -History:...

; his father was a former naval officer who eventually served as mayor of the town. As a child and adolescent, he studied the cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...

 and piano and began to compose his own music. When he was 18 he moved to San Francisco, where he lived in a Buddhist commune and studied North Indian music at the Ali Akbar College of Music
Ali Akbar College of Music
The Ali Akbar College of Music is the name of three schools founded by Indian musician Ali Akbar Khan to teach Indian classical music. The first was founded in 1956 in Calcutta, India. The second was founded in 1967 in Berkeley, California, but moved to its current location in San Rafael,...

 and Western composition part-time at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music
San Francisco Conservatory of Music
San Francisco Conservatory of Music, formerly the California Conservatory of Music, founded in 1917, is a music school, with an enrollment of about 400 students. It was launched by Ada Clement and Lillian Hodgehead in the remodeled home of Lillian's parents on Sacramento Street. It was called the...

 after earning his high school equivalency. He met Allen Ginsberg
Allen Ginsberg
Irwin Allen Ginsberg was an American poet and one of the leading figures of the Beat Generation in the 1950s. He vigorously opposed militarism, materialism and sexual repression...

, with whom he began to work, accompanying him on the cello as a soloist or in groups while Ginsberg sang or read his poetry.

In 1973, Russell moved to New York and enrolled in a formal degree program at the Manhattan School of Music
Manhattan School of Music
The Manhattan School of Music is a major music conservatory located on the Upper West Side of New York City. The school offers degrees on the bachelors, masters, and doctoral levels in the areas of classical and jazz performance and composition...

, cross-registering in electronic music and linguistics classes at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

. While studying at the conservatory, Russell repeatedly clashed with acclaimed serialist composer and instructor Charles Wuorinen
Charles Wuorinen
Charles Peter Wuorinen is a prolific Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer born and living in New York City. His catalog of more than 250 compositions includes works for orchestra, opera, chamber music, as well as solo instrumental and vocal works...

, who disparaged the composition "City Park" (a minimalist, non-narrative suite incorporating readings from the works of Ezra Pound
Ezra Pound
Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet and critic and a major figure in the early modernist movement in poetry...

 and Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...

) as "the most unattractive thing I've ever heard". Embittered by his experience, Russell briefly considered transferring to Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College is a private, Ivy League university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. The institution comprises a liberal arts college, Dartmouth Medical School, Thayer School of Engineering, and the Tuck School of Business, as well as 19 graduate programs in the arts and sciences...

 at the behest of experimental composer Christian Wolff
Christian Wolff (composer)
Christian G. Wolff is an American composer of experimental classical music.-Biography:Wolff was born in Nice in France to German literary publishers Helen and Kurt Wolff, who had published works by Franz Kafka, Robert Musil, and Walter Benjamin. After relocating to the U.S...

, whom he had sought out and befriended upon arriving in the Northeast. But after a chance meeting at a Wolff concert in Manhattan, he became close with Rhys Chatham
Rhys Chatham
Rhys Chatham is an American composer, guitarist, and trumpet player, primarily active in avant-garde and minimalist music. He is best known for his "guitar orchestra" compositions...

, who arranged for Russell to succeed him as music director of The Kitchen
The Kitchen
The Kitchen is a non-profit, multi-disciplinary art and performance space located at at 512 West 19th Street, between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City...

, a downtown avant-garde performance space. As a result, he abandoned his studies and remained in New York. Russell and Chatham later briefly roomed together in a sixth-story walkup apartment at 437 East 12th Street in the EEast Village
East Village, Manhattan
The East Village is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, lying east of Greenwich Village, south of Gramercy and Stuyvesant Town, and north of the Lower East Side...

; Ginsberg (who maintained his primary residence in the building from 1975 to 1996 and helped Russell secure the apartment) supplied electricity to the impoverished composers through an extension cord. Russell would reside in the apartment for the rest of his life.

During his tenure at The Kitchen (from the autumn of 1974 to the summer of 1975), he greatly expanded the breadth and purview of the venue's offerings, crafting a program that "support[ed] other local and relatively low profile composers rather than... accentuat[ing] the work of composers who were beginning to acquire an international reputation." This approach elicited controversy when Russell booked Boston-based proto-punk band The Modern Lovers
The Modern Lovers
The Modern Lovers were an American rock band led by Jonathan Richman in the 1970s and 1980s. The original band existed from 1970–74 but their recordings were not released until 1976 or later. It featured Richman and bassist Ernie Brooks with drummer David Robinson and keyboardist Jerry Harrison...

 for an engagement at the venue, widely regarded as a leading bastion of minimalism
Minimalist music
Minimal music is a style of music associated with the work of American composers La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Steve Reich, and Philip Glass. It originated in the New York Downtown scene of the 1960s and was initially viewed as a form of experimental music called the New York Hypnotic School....

. Russell's booking of Fluxus stalwart Henry Flynt
Henry Flynt
Henry Flynt is a philosopher, avant-garde musician, anti-art activist and exhibited artist often associated with Conceptual Art, Fluxus and Nihilism.-Background:...

's "punkabilly" ensemble Nova'billy, concluding his season as director, was likewise unsettling to the avant-garde establishment. According to biographer Tim Lawrence, "the decision to program the Modern Lovers and Talking Heads
Talking Heads
Talking Heads were an American New Wave and avant-garde band formed in 1975 in New York City and active until 1991. The band comprised David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Tina Weymouth and Jerry Harrison...

 was Russell’s way of demonstrating that minimalism could be found outside of compositional music, as well as his belief that pop music could be arty, energetic and fun at the same time."

From 1975 to 1979, Russell was a member of The Flying Hearts, recorded by John Hammond
John H. Hammond
John Henry Hammond II was an American record producer, musician and music critic from the 1930s to the early 1980s...

, which consisted of Russell (keyboards/vocals), ex-Modern Lovers member Ernie Brooks (bass/vocals), Larry Saltzman (guitar), and David Van Tieghem (drums, vocals); a later incarnation in the 1980s included Joyce Bowden (vocals) and Jesse Chamberlain (drums). This ensemble was frequently augmented in live and studio performances by the likes of Chatham, David Byrne
David Byrne (musician)
David Byrne is a musician and artist, best known as a founding member and principal songwriter of the American new wave band Talking Heads, which was active between 1975 and 1991. Since then, Byrne has released his own solo recordings and worked with various media including film, photography,...

, Jon Gibson, Peter Gordon, Jerry Harrison
Jerry Harrison
Jerry Harrison is an American songwriter, musician and producer...

, Garrett List
Garrett List
Garrett List is an American trombonist, vocalist and composer.In 1950, he moved with his family to Southern California. At the age of 18, he already was busy teaching, playing and composing music . In 1965 he left California and settled in New York, where he attended the famous Juilliard School of...

 (who succeeded Russell as musical director of The Kitchen), Andy Paley
Andy Paley
Andy Paley is a noted record producer and musician who has been active since the late 1960s. His work includes stints as a producer for such noted musicians as Madonna, the Ramones, Jonathan Richman, Debbie Harry, Brian Wilson and Jerry Lee Lewis....

, Lenny Pickett and Peter Zummo
Peter Zummo
Peter Zummo is an American composer and musician. He plays the trombone, valve trombone, euphonium, synthesizer, other electronic instruments, and also sings. He is associated with the postminimalist and Downtown aesthetics, and he describes his music as "minimalism plus a whole lot more."He...

. During the same period, various permutations of this ensemble, together with Glenn Iamaro, Bill Ruyle and Jon Sholle, performed & recorded excerpts from Instrumentals, a 48-hour long orchestral work that constituted Russell's first major work in the idiom. Selections from the Instrumentals sessions were eventually collected on an eponymously-titled album, released by Belgian label Disques du Crepuscule in 1984. The collaboration between Russell (once again as a keyboardist), Brooks, and Chamberlain would extend into The Necessaries, a power pop
Power pop
Power pop is a popular musical genre that draws its inspiration from 1960s British and American pop and rock music. It typically incorporates a combination of musical devices such as strong melodies, crisp vocal harmonies, economical arrangements, and prominent guitar riffs. Instrumental solos are...

 quartet fronted by guitarist Ed Tomney. Their lone 1981 album on Sire Records
Sire Records
Sire Records is an American record label, owned by Warner Music Group and distributed through Warner Bros. Records.-Beginnings:The label was founded in 1966 as Sire Productions by Seymour Stein and Richard Gottehrer, each investing ten thousand dollars into the new company. Its early releases as a...

 (initially released as Big Sky before being tweaked and re-released as Event Horizon) featured minimal songwriting contributions from Russell, who abruptly left the band at the approach to the Holland Tunnel
Holland Tunnel
The Holland Tunnel is a highway tunnel under the Hudson River connecting the island of Manhattan in New York City with Jersey City, New Jersey at Interstate 78 on the mainland. Unusual for an American public works project, it is not named for a government official, politician, or local hero or...

 before an important concert in Washington, D.C..

Around 1976, Russell became a habitue of New York's nascent underground disco scene, namely Nicky Siano
Nicky Siano
Nicky Siano was a resident DJ at Studio 54. Siano was born in Brooklyn, New York.In 1971 at the age of 16 he got his first djing gig, with the help of Robin Lord, and in 1972 he opened The Gallery in SoHo, Manhattan with his older brother Joe Siano. At the time he was considered to be the best DJ...

's Gallery on Houston Street in SoHo
SoHo
SoHo is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City, notable for being the location of many artists' lofts and art galleries, and also, more recently, for the wide variety of stores and shops ranging from trendy boutiques to outlets of upscale national and international chain stores...

. In a 2007 interview with Wax Poetics magazine, Siano downplayed the popular myth that Russell's interest in the genre solidified over the course of a single night, noting that "Louis [Aquilone, Siano's best friend and Russell's then-lover] was at the Gallery every single Saturday night. After spending a few Saturday nights without Louis, Arthur decided to come. After the third or fourth time there, he started to come without Louis". Though an eager dancer, Siano has described Russell's style as "strange... outrageous, weird... he was definitely a 'white-boy' dancer". By the time Russell was involved with Tom Lee in the 1980s, his nightlife activities had subsided to a large extent; "it wasn't like Arthur and I were in some gay disco world, getting dressed to go out to the club and dancing the night away," Lee has said. "We’d go to CBGB
CBGB
CBGB was a music club at 315 Bowery at Bleecker Street in the borough of Manhattan in New York City.Founded by Hilly Kristal in 1973, it was originally intended to feature its namesake musical styles, but became a forum for American punk and New Wave bands like Ramones, Misfits, Television, the...

, we'd go to Max's Kansas City
Max's Kansas City
Max's Kansas City was a nightclub and restaurant at 213 Park Avenue South, in New York City, which was a gathering spot for musicians, poets, artists and politicians in the 1960s and 1970s.-Origin of name:...

, we'd go to Tier 3 but we'd listen to the group and then go home. For him it was about the daily grind of actually playing music."

In 1977, trenchantly attracted to the minimalist rhythms of disco and funded by Siano's "Gallery war chest", Russell wrote and co-produced "Kiss Me Again" in collaboration with a diverse array of musicians - longtime collaborator Peter Zummo
Peter Zummo
Peter Zummo is an American composer and musician. He plays the trombone, valve trombone, euphonium, synthesizer, other electronic instruments, and also sings. He is associated with the postminimalist and Downtown aesthetics, and he describes his music as "minimalism plus a whole lot more."He...

, Byrne (on rhythm guitar), Gloria Gaynor
Gloria Gaynor
Gloria Gaynor is an American singer, best known for the disco era hits; "I Will Survive" , "Never Can Say Goodbye" , "Let Me Know " and "I Am What I Am" .-Early career:Gaynor was a singer with the Soul...

 veterans Wilbur Bascomb (bass) and Alan Schwartzberg (drums), and Henry Flynt - under the moniker of Dinosaur. The first disco single to be released by Sire Records, it was a fairly large club hit, reportedly selling "some ungodly amount, like two hundred thousand copies". Despite the modicum of commercial success and "ecstatic reaction" elicited by the record in the New York underground, according to Siano, "Ray Caviano [head of Warner/Sire's disco division] never really pushed it" and the record failed to cross over into the mainstream; nevertheless, the song's main hook was interpolated by Desmond Child
Desmond Child
Desmond Child is an American musician, songwriter, and producer. He is a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame.-Career:...

 (who was acquainted with Russell via Larry Salzman) on his minor 1979 hit "Our Love is Insane", leading Russell to accuse the musician of infringement among his friends. Although the duo was signed to Sire to produce a followup single featuring Gerri Griffin of the Voices of East Harlem, the sessions stalled because of Siano's burgeoning drug habit (leading him to take temporary refuge in California) and Russell's myopic approach to recording.

In 1980, Loose Joints (initially known as the Little All-Stars) was formed out of Russell, onetime DJ Steve D'Aquisto
Steve D'Aquisto
Steve D'Acquisto was an American disco dj and record producer.He started the concept of the record pool with David Mancuso and Vince Aletti in 1975 in New York City.He was also a collaborator of Arthur Russell...

, Columbia student and Russell confidante Steven Hall, three singers found on The Loft
The Loft
The Loft is the location for the first underground dance party that was created by David Mancuso on February 14, 1970 in New York. Since then, the term The Loft has come to represent Mancuso's own version of a non-commercial party where no alcohol, food, or beverages are sold...

's dancefloor, miscellaneous other musicians, and the Ingram Brothers rhythm section (best known for later backing Patti LaBelle
Patti LaBelle
Patricia Louise Holte-Edwards , better known under the stage name, Patti LaBelle, is a Grammy Award winning American singer, author and actress who has spent over 50 years in the music industry...

). With a stated ambition to create "the disco White Album", the group—under contract to leading underground disco label West End Records—recorded hours of music but only released three songs, "Is It All Over My Face", "Pop Your Funk" (in two disparate arrangements, including a no wave
No Wave
No Wave was a short-lived but influential underground music, film, performance art, video, and contemporary art scene that had its beginnings during the mid-1970s in New York City. The term No Wave is in part satirical word play rejecting the commercial elements of the then-popular New Wave genre...

-influenced single edit), and "Tell You Today". D'Aquisto, a non-musician who favored such extemporaneous touches as off-key singing and the input of street buskers, repeatedly clashed with the perfectionist Russell throughout the sessions. Despite the acrimony, Hall felt that "[D'Aquisto] allowed shy Arthur to come out of his shell in the gayest sense. He also taught him how to let go in terms of slavishly and clairvoyantly searching for and then locking in the groove." The experimental recordings bemused many of downtown New York's disco cognoscenti, including West End head Mel Cheren and Loft proprietor David Mancuso
David Mancuso
David Mancuso created the popular "by invitation only" parties in New York City later known as "The Loft". The first party "Love Saves The Day" was in 1970...

, a predicament that eventually led Larry Levan
Larry Levan
Larry Levan was a DJ best known for his decade-long residency at the New York City night club Paradise Garage, which has been described as the prototype of the modern dance club. He developed a cult following who referred to his sets as "Saturday Mass"...

 to remix "Is It All Over My Face" for club play; the ensuing track, based around a female vocal wiped from the original mix (and recorded on stolen studio time with Francois Kevorkian
François Kevorkian
François Kevorkian, alias François K, is a French DJ of Armenian origin, remixer, producer and record label owner. Having started his career in renowned clubs such as the Paradise Garage and Studio 54, the New York City resident is widely considered as one of the forefathers of house...

 as an uncredited co-mixer) was an enduring staple of Levan's sets at the Paradise Garage
Paradise Garage
The Paradise Garage was a discotheque notable in the history of modern gay and nightclub cultures and in dance and pop music. It was founded by Michael Brody, its sole proprietor, and was located at 84 King Street, in the Hudson Square neighborhood of New York City. It operated from 1976 to 1987...

 and a formative influence on Chicago house
Chicago house
Chicago house is a style of house music, a genre of electronic dance music which emerged in Chicago in the mid-1980s. Stylistically, Chicago house has no widely accepted definition, but generally includes the first house music productions by Chicago-based artists throughout the 1980s, and any later...

, in addition to becoming a bona fide commercial hit in the New York area via airplay on WBLS
WBLS
WBLS is an urban adult contemporary FM radio station in New York City, operating on 107.5 MHz. WBLS is owned by Inner City Broadcasting Corporation along with sister station WLIB...

.

In 1981, Russell and entrepreneur Will Socolov (who had partially financed the Loose Joints sessions) founded Sleeping Bag Records
Sleeping Bag Records
Sleeping Bag Records is a defunct New York City-based old school hip hop and dance music independent record label that operated from 1981 to 1992...

; their first release was a recording of 24-24 Music, a controversial disco-influenced composition (with rhythmic shifts every 24 bars, hence the title) that had been commissioned by and first performed at The Kitchen in 1979. The first limited pressing of this record had an hand made silk-screened cover. Steven Hall later described its debut as "the best performance of Arthur's work that I ever attended... it was like really hot dance music and no one got it. The idea that Arthur would turn around and bring that [dance] music into their venue and present it as serious music was really very challenging to them, and very threatening to them." "Go Bang," originally released on this album but recorded three years earlier by an ensemble that included Zummo, Peter Gordon, academic/composer Julius Eastman
Julius Eastman
Julius Eastman was an African-American composer, pianist, vocalist, and dancer of minimalist tendencies. He was among the first musicians to combine minimalist processes with elements of pop music...

, Bascomb, and John and Jimmy Ingram was remixed as a 12" single by Francois Kevorkian
François Kevorkian
François Kevorkian, alias François K, is a French DJ of Armenian origin, remixer, producer and record label owner. Having started his career in renowned clubs such as the Paradise Garage and Studio 54, the New York City resident is widely considered as one of the forefathers of house...

. Kevorkian's remix of "Go Bang" and Levan's remix of "In the Cornbelt" (another track from the 24-24 suite) were frequently played at the Paradise Garage.

In 1983, the album Tower of Meaning (Chatham Square) was released in a limited pressing on Phillip Glass's private label. The recording was made up of incidental music intended to accompany director Robert Wilson
Robert Wilson (director)
Robert Wilson is an American avant-garde stage director and playwright who has been called "[America]'s — or even the world's — foremost vanguard 'theater artist'". Over the course of his wide-ranging career, he has also worked as a choreographer, performer, painter, sculptor, video...

's staging of Medea, a partnership arranged by Glass. Although widely perceived as an important breakthrough for Russell in the compositional world, creative squabbling between the downtown luminaries culminated in Wilson barring the composer from attending rehearsals and eventually ousting Russell from the project altogether in favor of British composer Gavin Bryars
Gavin Bryars
Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...

. The "compelling and meditative recording", conducted by Julius Eastman, represents just a fragment of Russell's score, which includes voices along with its instrumentation.
While Russell would remain tangentially affiliated with the new music sphere in New York until his death, continuing to perform in solo and group configurations at The Kitchen and Experimental Intermedia Foundation, Tower of Meaning was his final orchestral effort.

At the same time, Russell continued to release dance singles such as "Tell You Today" (4th and Broadway, 1983), an upbeat dance groove and Loose Joints holdover featuring the vocals of Joyce Bowden. Additional releases that followed included "Wax the Van" (Jump Street, 1987), a collaboration between Russell and erstwhile James Brown
James Brown
James Joseph Brown was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and recording artist. He is the originator of Funk and is recognized as a major figure in the 20th century popular music for both his vocals and dancing. He has been referred to as "The Godfather of Soul," "Mr...

 foil Lola Blank (and wife of Bob Blank, Russell's preferred studio engineer); the Peter Zummo collaboration "Treehouse/Schoolbell" (Sleeping Bag, 1986); and 'Let's Go Swimming' (Upside/Rough Trade
Rough Trade Records
Rough Trade Records is an independent record label based in London. It was formed in 1978 by Geoff Travis who had opened a record store off Ladbroke Grove...

, 1986), which anticipated later developments in tech house
Tech house
Tech house is a subgenre of house music that mixes elements of minimal techno into simple, 4-to-4 beats found in soulful deep house. The genre came to prominence in the late-1990s atmosphere of American clubs as soul influenced Detroit-style techno that also borrowed elements from house before...

 and was Russell's only dance single to be released under his own name. The latter two records were remixed by legendary 70s-era DJ Walter Gibbons
Walter Gibbons
Walter Gibbons was an American record producer, early disco DJ and remixer.-Influence:He was an important part of the early 1970s New York disco underground scene, influencing garage and House music DJs like Frankie Knuckles and Larry Levan. He also laid the foundations for early 1980s...

, who had renounced his career for evangelical Christianity and was employed as a buyer at Rock and Soul Records in Midtown
Midtown
-In cities:Nepal*Midtown, Kathmandu, NepalUnited States*Midtown, Agoura Hills, California*Midtown Atlanta, Georgia**Midtown , passenger rail station near this area*Midtown Columbus, Georgia*Midtown, Detroit, Michigan...

. Despite Gibbons's religious predilections, the two forged a dependable (if occasionally tempestuous) working relationship; further Gibbons/Russell collaborations include "C-Thru" (a dance version of "See Through" on World of Echo
World of Echo
World of Echo is an album by Arthur Russell. It was released in 1986 on Upside Records in the United States and on Rough Trade Records in the United Kingdom. Audika Records issued a limited edition CD on 27 October 2004 which included bonus tracks and a DVD with footage by Phill Niblock...

that remained unreleased until 2010) and a remix of Russell's "Calling All Kids" (eventually released on the 2004 compilation Calling out of Context)

The rejection of Russell's Corn album (a suite of hip-hop-infused electropop, much of which later saw release on Calling out of Context) by Socolov in 1985, coupled with creative disagreements between the two over "Wax The Van", resulted in Russell divesting himself from Sleeping Bag Records shortly after the release of "Schoolbell/Treehouse" in 1986. According to Bob Blank in a followup to an Internet reposting of the (purportedly fallacious) 1986 article that detailed the subterfuge, Socolov "wanted to take the label to 'another level'" and "essentially screwed [Arthur] out of his part of the company".

During the mid 1980s, Russell gave many performances, either accompanying himself on cello with a myriad of effects, or working with a small ensemble consisting of percussionist Mustafa Ahmed, Steven Hall, Ernie Brooks, composer Elodie Lauten
Elodie Lauten
Elodie Lauten is a composer described as postminimalist or a microtonalist.-Biography:Born in Paris, France, Lauten was classically trained as a pianist since age 7. She received a Master's in composition from New York University where she studied Western composition with Dinu Ghezzo and Indian...

 and Peter Zummo.

September 1986 saw the release of World of Echo
World of Echo
World of Echo is an album by Arthur Russell. It was released in 1986 on Upside Records in the United States and on Rough Trade Records in the United Kingdom. Audika Records issued a limited edition CD on 27 October 2004 which included bonus tracks and a DVD with footage by Phill Niblock...

(Upside/Rough Trade, 1986). Critically heralded as "a magnum opus of sorts" by contemporary critics, it incorporated many of his ideas for pop, dance and classical music for both solo and cello format. The album was well-reviewed in Britain and included in Melody Maker
Melody Maker
Melody Maker, published in the United Kingdom, was, according to its publisher IPC Media, the world's oldest weekly music newspaper. It was founded in 1926 as a magazine targeted at musicians; in 2000 it was merged into "long-standing rival" New Musical Express.-1950s–1960s:Originally the Melody...

's "Top Thirty Releases of 1986", but a complete failure commercially.

Russell also collaborated with a number of choreographers, including John Bernd, Diane Madden
Diane Madden
-Early life:Dianne Madden was born in 1959 and attended Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts.-Career:Beginning in 1980, she worked with the Trisha Brown Company. She was rehearsal director from 1984 to 2000....

, Alison Salzinger and Stephanie Woodard.

Personal life

As a young adult, Russell led a seemingly heterosexual lifestyle; at least two of these relationships (with Muriel Fuiji in San Francisco and later Sydney Murray in New York) have been substantiated.

Although he briefly dated Allen Ginsberg in 1973, Russell did not identify as a gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....

 man until becoming involved with hairdresser Louis Aquilone in 1976. After the relationship with Aquilone dissolved, Russell dated Donald Murk (who subsequently became Russell's manager) for several years; according to Steven Hall, the relationship was tempestuous, "with lots of threesomes and fighting and very dramatic emotional scenes". As this relationship drew to a close, Russell became acquainted with silkscreen operator Tom Lee; their friendship rapidly evolved into a domestic partnership.

Although Russell continued to dally with other men and women, their partnership endured until his death in 1992. Lee—-who became a schoolteacher and continued to reside in the couple's rent-controlled EEast Village
East Village, Manhattan
The East Village is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, lying east of Greenwich Village, south of Gramercy and Stuyvesant Town, and north of the Lower East Side...

 apartment until February 2011—-is the executor of Russell's estate. Their relationship is detailed at length in Matt Wolf's Wild Combination: A Portrait of Arthur Russell.

Death

Shortly after the release of World of Echo, Russell was diagnosed as HIV
HIV
Human immunodeficiency virus is a lentivirus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome , a condition in humans in which progressive failure of the immune system allows life-threatening opportunistic infections and cancers to thrive...

-positive. As the virus yielded to the more deleterious side effects of AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...

 (including throat cancer
Head and neck cancer
Head and neck cancer refers to a group of biologically similar cancers that start in the upper aerodigestive tract, including the lip, oral cavity , nasal cavity , paranasal sinuses, pharynx, and larynx. 90% of head and neck cancers are squamous cell carcinomas , originating from the mucosal lining...

, forcing Russell to undergo chemotherapy), he remained prolific, working on voice-and-cello songs for an album to be released by Philip Glass's Point Music (some of which surfaced on the posthumous Another Thought in 1994) and an electronic pop suite influenced by the likes of 808 State
808 State
808 State are a British electronic music outfit, formed in 1987 in Manchester, taking their name from the Roland TR-808 drum machine and their common state of mind...

 and William Orbit
William Orbit
William Orbit is an English musician, composer and record producer, perhaps best known to most for his work on Madonna's album Ray of Light. He has also co-produced several unreleased Madonna songs originally recorded for other albums...

 (provisionally titled 1-800-DINOSAUR) for Rough Trade Records. Much of the material intended for this project was included on 2004's Calling Out of Context.

Russell died of AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...

 on April 4, 1992, at the age of 40. In an April 28 column, Kyle Gann
Kyle Gann
Kyle Eugene Gann is an American professor of music, critic and composer born in Dallas, Texas. As a critic for The Village Voice and other publications he has been a supporter of progressive music including such Downtown movements as postminimalism and totalism.- As composer :As a composer his...

 of The Village Voice
The Village Voice
The Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper and news and features website in New York City that features investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts and music coverage, and events listings for New York City...

wrote: "His recent performances had been so infrequent due to illness, his songs were so personal, that it seems as though he simply vanished into his music."

Cultural significance and influence

Russell was prolific, but was also notorious for leaving songs unfinished and continually revising his music. Ernie Brooks said Russell "never arrived at a completed version of anything." Peter Gordon stated, "his quest wasn't really to do a finished product but more to do with exploring his different ways of working musically." He left behind more than 1,000 tapes when he died, 40 of them different mixes of one song.

In 2007, "This Is How We Walk on the Moon", a song on the 1994 album Another Thought, was used in a UK television commercial for T-Mobile
T-Mobile
T-Mobile International AG is a German-based holding company for Deutsche Telekom AG's various mobile communications subsidiaries outside Germany. Based in Bonn, Germany, its subsidiaries operate GSM and UMTS-based cellular networks in Europe, the United States, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands...

. Artist Johanna Billing
Johanna Billing
Johanna Billing is a conceptual artist from Sweden, working mainly with video. She is best known for the works "You Don't Love Me Yet" and "Magical World" . She deals with issues related to learning and how time plays a key role in this process...

 exhibited a video of the same title, which included a cover of the song, at Documenta 12 in Kassel
Kassel
Kassel is a town located on the Fulda River in northern Hesse, Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Kassel Regierungsbezirk and the Kreis of the same name and has approximately 195,000 inhabitants.- History :...

 and at a gallery in Edinburgh in 2007. A tribute EP, Four Songs by Arthur Russell
Four Songs by Arthur Russell
Four Songs by Arthur Russell is a tribute EP of songs written by Arthur Russell, featuring Vera November, Jens Lekman, Taken By Trees, and Joel Gibb.-Track listing:#"Our Last Night Together" #"A Little Lost"...

curated by Jens Lekman
Jens Lekman
Jens Martin Lekman is a Swedish musician. His music is guitar-based pop with heavy use of samples and strings, with lyrics that are often witty, romantic, and melancholic. The English lyrics reflect an advanced knowledge of the language and its idioms...

 was also released in 2007, through Rough Trade Records.

Filmmaker Matt Wolf completed a feature-length documentary
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...

 on Russell called Wild Combination: A Portrait of Arthur Russell. It premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival on February 13, 2008.

Tim Lawrence, an author and academic at the University of East London
University of East London
The University of East London is a university located in the London Borough of Newham, East London, England, based at two campuses in Stratford and Docklands areas...

, has written a biography of Russell, entitled Hold On To Your Dreams: Arthur Russell and the Downtown Music Scene, published in 2009.

Singles

  • Dinosaur: "Kiss Me Again" (1978). Sire Records
    Sire Records
    Sire Records is an American record label, owned by Warner Music Group and distributed through Warner Bros. Records.-Beginnings:The label was founded in 1966 as Sire Productions by Seymour Stein and Richard Gottehrer, each investing ten thousand dollars into the new company. Its early releases as a...

    . Vocals by Myriam Valle. Produced by Arthur Russell & Nicky Siano.
  • Loose Joints: "Is It All Over My Face" / "Pop Your Funk" (1980). West End Records
    West End Records
    West End Records is a record label, which is known as one of the most prominent labels in dance music’s history along with Prelude Records, Salsoul Records and Casablanca Records.-History:...

    . Produced by Arthur Russell & Steve D'Aquisto.
  • Loose Joints: "Is It All Over My Face (Female version)" (1980). West End Records. Produced by Arthur Russell & Steve D'Aquisto.
  • Dinosaur L: "Go Bang" (1982), from 24-24 Music. Sleeping Bag Records
    Sleeping Bag Records
    Sleeping Bag Records is a defunct New York City-based old school hip hop and dance music independent record label that operated from 1981 to 1992...

    . Vocals by Lola Blank, Arthur Russell, and Julius Eastman.
  • Loose Joints: "Tell You Today" (1983). 4th and Broadway. Vocals by Joyce Bowden. Produced by Killer Whale (Russell) & Steve D'Aquisto.
  • Felix: "Tiger Stripes" (1984). Sleeping Bag Records. Vocals by Maxine Bell. Produced by Killer Whale & Nicky Siano.
  • Indian Ocean: "School Bell/Treehouse" (1986). Sleeping Bag Records (US) / 4th and Broadway (UK). Produced by Arthur Russell & Peter Zummo.
  • Arthur Russell: "Let's Go Swimming" (1986). Logarythm (US) / Rough Trade (UK). Produced by Arthur Russell & Mark Freedman. Edited by Killer Whale.
  • Lola (Lola Blank): "Wax the Van" (1987). Jump Street Records. Vocals by Lola Blank. Produced by Bob and Lola Blank.
  • Lola (Lola Blank): "I Need More" (1988). Vinylmania. Vocals by Lola Blank. Produced by Bob and Lola Blank.
  • Arthur Russell: "Springfield" (2006). Audika Records. Includes a remix by The DFA
    DFA Records
    DFA Records is an independent record label and production team, launched in September 2001 by Mo' Wax co-founder Tim Goldsworthy, musician James Murphy, and manager Jonathan Galkin. The label has an exclusive distribution deal with major record label EMI....

    .

Mixes/Edits

  • Sounds of JHS 126 Brooklyn: "Chill Pill" (1984). Sleeping Bag Records. "Under Water Mix" by Killer Whale.
  • Clandestine featuring Ned Sublette
    Ned Sublette
    Ned Sublette is an American composer, musician, record producer and musicologist. Sublette studied Spanish Classical Guitar with Hector Garcia at the University of New Mexico and with Emilio Pujol in Spain. He studied composition with Kenneth Gaburo at the University of California, San Diego...

    : "Radio Rhythm (Signalsmart)" (1984). Sleeping Bag Records. "Extra Cheese" and "Dub" mixes by Killer Whale & Nicky Siano.
  • Bonzo Goes To Washington (Bootsy Collins
    Bootsy Collins
    William Earl "Bootsy" Collins is an American funk bassist, singer, and songwriter.Rising to prominence with James Brown in the late 1960s, and with Parliament-Funkadelic in the '70s, Collins's driving bass guitar and humorous vocals established him as one of the leading names in funk...

     & Jerry Harrison): "5 Minutes" (1984). Sleeping Bag Records. "R-R-R Radio" and "B-B-B Bombing" mixes "chopped and channeled" by Arthur Russell.

Studio albums

  • 24-24 Music (1982; recorded 1979-80). Sleeping Bag Records.
  • Tower of Meaning (Chatham Square) (1983). Chatham Square (limited pressing).
  • Instrumentals (1984). Disques du Crepuscule. Recorded with The Flying Hearts and Glenn Lamaro, Bill Ruyle, and Jon Sholle
    Jon Sholle
    Jon Sholle, born April 2, 1949 in New York City, is an American guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, and musician who plays mainly jazz, bluegrass, rock, country, roots music, and folk music.-As musician:...

    .
  • World of Echo
    World of Echo
    World of Echo is an album by Arthur Russell. It was released in 1986 on Upside Records in the United States and on Rough Trade Records in the United Kingdom. Audika Records issued a limited edition CD on 27 October 2004 which included bonus tracks and a DVD with footage by Phill Niblock...

    (1986). Upside Records (Mute Records) [US]/Rough Trade [UK]. Recorded and produced by Phil Niblock. Re-issued in 2004 by Audika Records (US)/Rough Trade (UK).

Compilations/EPs

  • Another Thought (1994). Point Music 438 891-2. Compiled with help from Mikel Rouse
    Mikel Rouse
    Mikel Rouse is an American composer. He has been associated with a Downtown New York movement known as totalism, and is best known for his operas, including Dennis Cleveland, about a television talk show host, which Rouse wrote and starred in.Rouse writes music that is idiomatically and...

    . Reissued in 2006 by Orange Mountain Music.
  • Calling Out of Context
    Calling Out of Context
    Calling Out of Context is a compilation album of songs written and recorded by experimental musician Arthur Russell. It was released on March 16, 2004 by Audika Records in the United States and by Rough Trade Records in the United Kingdom...

    (2004). Audika Records. Compiled by Steve Knutson.
  • The World of Arthur Russell
    The World of Arthur Russell
    The World of Arthur Russell is a compilation album by Arthur Russell, released in 2004 on Soul Jazz Records.-Track listing:#"Go Bang" – 7:36#"Wax the Van" – 5:27#"Is It All Over My Face" – 6:57...

    (2004). Soul Jazz Records
    Soul Jazz Records
    Soul Jazz Records is a British-based record label. The label started in the 1990s, releasing compilation albums of predominantly black music, including reggae, soul, ska, Dub and jazz...

    .
  • First Thought Best Thought (2006). Audika Records. [Includes Instrumentals Volume 1 & 2, Reach One, Tower of Meaning, and Sketch for the Face of Helen].
  • Springfield EP (2006). Audika Records.
  • Love Is Overtaking Me (2008). Audika Records (US)/Rough Trade (UK). Compiled by Ernie Brooks, Steve Knutson, & Tom Lee. Recordings digitally restored by Chris Taylor
    Chris Taylor (Grizzly Bear musician)
    Chris Taylor is a multi-instrumentalist and producer best known for his role of bass player in the Brooklyn based indie folk group, Grizzly Bear.-Biography:...

     of Grizzly Bear
    Grizzly Bear (band)
    Grizzly Bear is a Brooklyn-based indie rock band, composed of Edward Droste , Daniel Rossen , Chris Taylor and Christopher Bear . The band employs traditional and electronic instruments...

    .

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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