Jon Hassell
Encyclopedia
Jon Hassell is an American
trumpet
player and composer
. He is known for his influence in the world music
scene and his unusual electronic manipulation of the trumpet sound.
, Hassell received his Master's degree
from the Eastman School of Music
in Rochester, New York
. During this time he became involved in European serial music
, especially the work of Karlheinz Stockhausen
, and so after finishing his studies at Eastman, he enrolled in the Cologne Course for New Music for two years (founded and directed by Stockhausen). Hassell returned to the U.S. in 1967, where he met Terry Riley
in Buffalo, New York
and performed on the first recording of Riley's seminal work In C
in 1968. He pursued his PhD
in musicology
in Buffalo and performed in La Monte Young
's "Dream House" (aka Theatre of Eternal Music
) in New York City
.
On his return to Buffalo in the early 1970s, Hassell was introduced to the music of Indian Pandit Pran Nath
, a specialist in the Kiranic
style of singing. Hassell, Young, Marian Zazeela
(Young's wife) and Riley went together to India to study with Nath. His work with Nath awoke his appetite for world music
, and on the album Vernal Equinox, he used his trumpet to imitate the vocal techniques of Nath (treated with various electronic effects
) where he stated:
In 1980, he collaborated with Brian Eno
on the album Fourth World, Vol. 1: Possible Musics. Hassell's 1981 release, Dream Theory in Malaya
, led to a performance at the first World of Music, Arts and Dance
(WOMAD) Festival, organized by Peter Gabriel
. He performed and co-wrote tracks on David Sylvian
's first solo album Brilliant Trees
, and its instrumental follow-up Words with the Shaman. In the late 1980s, Hassell contributed to Gabriel's Passion: Music for The Last Temptation of Christ
, the soundtrack album for Martin Scorsese's
film, The Last Temptation of Christ
. Hassell and Pete Scaturro composed the electronic theme music for the television show The Practice
.
. This musical conception combines the philosophy and techniques of minimalism
with Asian and African styles, and relies heavily on the use of electronic instruments. Critics of Hassell's style have noted its incorporation of New Age and world music styles, but have also detected the influence of Miles Davis
, particularly Davis'
use of electronics, modal harmony
and understated lyricism. Both on record and during live performances, Hassell makes use of traditional western instruments—keyboards, bass, electric guitar, and percussion—to create modal, hypnotic grooves, over which he plays microtonally-inflected trumpet phrases in the style of Nath's
Kiranic
vocals.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
trumpet
Trumpet
The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...
player and 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...
. He is known for his influence in the world music
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...
scene and his unusual electronic manipulation of the trumpet sound.
Life and career
Born in Memphis, TennesseeMemphis, Tennessee
Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the 4th Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi rivers....
, Hassell received his Master's degree
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
from the Eastman School of Music
Eastman School of Music
The Eastman School of Music is a music conservatory located in Rochester, New York. The Eastman School is a professional school within the University of Rochester...
in Rochester, New York
Rochester, New York
Rochester is a city in Monroe County, New York, south of Lake Ontario in the United States. Known as The World's Image Centre, it was also once known as The Flour City, and more recently as The Flower City...
. During this time he became involved in European serial music
Serialism
In music, serialism is a method or technique of composition that uses a series of values to manipulate different musical elements. Serialism began primarily with Arnold Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique, though his contemporaries were also working to establish serialism as one example of...
, especially the work of Karlheinz Stockhausen
Karlheinz Stockhausen
Karlheinz Stockhausen was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. Another critic calls him "one of the great visionaries of 20th-century music"...
, and so after finishing his studies at Eastman, he enrolled in the Cologne Course for New Music for two years (founded and directed by Stockhausen). Hassell returned to the U.S. in 1967, where he met Terry Riley
Terry Riley
Terrence Mitchell Riley, is an American composer intrinsically associated with the minimalist school of Western classical music and was a pioneer of the movement...
in Buffalo, New York
Buffalo, New York
Buffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...
and performed on the first recording of Riley's seminal work In C
In C
In C is a semi-aleatoric musical piece composed by Terry Riley in 1964 for any number of people, although he suggests "a group of about 35 is desired if possible but smaller or larger groups will work"...
in 1968. He pursued his PhD
Doctor of Philosophy
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...
in musicology
Musicology
Musicology is the scholarly study of music. The word is used in narrow, broad and intermediate senses. In the narrow sense, musicology is confined to the music history of Western culture...
in Buffalo and performed in La Monte Young
La Monte Young
La Monte Thornton Young is an American avant-garde composer, musician, and artist.Young is generally recognized as the first minimalist composer. His works have been included among the most important and radical post-World War II avant-garde, experimental, and contemporary music. Young is...
's "Dream House" (aka Theatre of Eternal Music
Theatre of Eternal Music
The Theatre of Eternal Music, sometimes later known as The Dream Syndicate, was a mid 1960s musical group formed by La Monte Young, that focused on experimental drone music. It featured the performances of La Monte Young, John Cale, Angus MacLise, Terry Jennings, Marian Zazeela, Tony Conrad, Billy...
) in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
On his return to Buffalo in the early 1970s, Hassell was introduced to the music of Indian Pandit Pran Nath
Pandit Pran Nath
Pandit Pran Nath was a Hindustani classical singer and teacher of the Kirana gharana , with a successful American career.-Early life:...
, a specialist in the Kiranic
Kirana Gharana
Kirana Gharana is one of the most prolific Hindustani khyal gharanas.-History:The name of this school of music derives from Kirana or Kairana, a town and tehsil of Muzzafarnagar District in Uttar Pradesh...
style of singing. Hassell, Young, Marian Zazeela
Marian Zazeela
Marian Zazeela is a light-artist, designer, painter and musician based in New York City.-Life and work:Born to Russian-Jewish parents and raised in the Bronx, Marian Zazeela was educated at the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts and at Bennington College where she...
(Young's wife) and Riley went together to India to study with Nath. His work with Nath awoke his appetite for world music
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...
, and on the album Vernal Equinox, he used his trumpet to imitate the vocal techniques of Nath (treated with various electronic effects
Audio signal processing
Audio signal processing, sometimes referred to as audio processing, is the intentional alteration of auditory signals, or sound. As audio signals may be electronically represented in either digital or analog format, signal processing may occur in either domain...
) where he stated:
- "From 1973 up until then I was totally immersed in playing raga on the trumpet. I wanted the physical dexterity to be able to come into a room and be able to do something that nobody else in the world could do. My aim was to make a music that was vertically integrated in such a way that at any cross-sectional moment you were not able to pick a single element out as being from a particular country or genre of music."
In 1980, he collaborated with Brian Eno
Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
on the album Fourth World, Vol. 1: Possible Musics. Hassell's 1981 release, Dream Theory in Malaya
Dream Theory in Malaya
Dream Theory in Malaya : Fourth World Volume Two is a World music album by Jon Hassell, released in 1981. It is the "sequel" to his collaboration with Brian Eno, Fourth World Vol...
, led to a performance at the first World of Music, Arts and Dance
World of Music, Arts and Dance
WOMAD is an international arts festival. The central aim of WOMAD is to celebrate the world's many forms of music, arts and dance.-History:...
(WOMAD) Festival, organized by Peter Gabriel
Peter Gabriel
Peter Brian Gabriel is an English singer, musician, and songwriter who rose to fame as the lead vocalist and flautist of the progressive rock group Genesis. After leaving Genesis, Gabriel went on to a successful solo career...
. He performed and co-wrote tracks on David Sylvian
David Sylvian
David Sylvian is an English singer-songwriter and musician who came to prominence in the late 1970s as the lead vocalist and main songwriter in the group Japan...
's first solo album Brilliant Trees
Brilliant Trees
Brilliant Trees is the debut solo album by British singer/songwriter David Sylvian, released in 1984.-History:Produced by Sylvian with Steve Nye, it was his first full length release after the break-up of his band Japan in late 1982. The album peaked at no.4 in the UK, the highest chart position of...
, and its instrumental follow-up Words with the Shaman. In the late 1980s, Hassell contributed to Gabriel's Passion: Music for The Last Temptation of Christ
Passion: Music for The Last Temptation of Christ
Passion: Music for The Last Temptation of Christ is a musical album released in 1989 by Peter Gabriel. It is his second soundtrack and eighth album overall...
, the soundtrack album for Martin Scorsese's
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
film, The Last Temptation of Christ
The Last Temptation of Christ (film)
The Last Temptation of Christ is a 1988 drama film directed by Martin Scorsese. It is a film adaptation of the controversial 1953 novel of the same name by Nikos Kazantzakis. It stars Willem Dafoe as Jesus Christ, Harvey Keitel as Judas Iscariot, Barbara Hershey as Mary Magdalene, David Bowie as...
. Hassell and Pete Scaturro composed the electronic theme music for the television show The Practice
The Practice
The Practice is an American legal drama created by David E. Kelley centering on the partners and associates at a Boston law firm. Running for eight seasons from 1997 to 2004, the show won the Emmy in 1998 and 1999 for Best Drama Series, and spawned the successful and lighter spin-off series Boston...
.
Style
Hassell coined the term "Fourth World" to describe his musical style, as expressed both in his trumpet playing and in his approach to compositionMusical composition
Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...
. This musical conception combines the philosophy and techniques 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....
with Asian and African styles, and relies heavily on the use of electronic instruments. Critics of Hassell's style have noted its incorporation of New Age and world music styles, but have also detected the influence of Miles Davis
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III was an American jazz musician, trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop, cool jazz,...
, particularly Davis'
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III was an American jazz musician, trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop, cool jazz,...
use of electronics, modal harmony
Harmony
In music, harmony is the use of simultaneous pitches , or chords. The study of harmony involves chords and their construction and chord progressions and the principles of connection that govern them. Harmony is often said to refer to the "vertical" aspect of music, as distinguished from melodic...
and understated lyricism. Both on record and during live performances, Hassell makes use of traditional western instruments—keyboards, bass, electric guitar, and percussion—to create modal, hypnotic grooves, over which he plays microtonally-inflected trumpet phrases in the style of Nath's
Pandit Pran Nath
Pandit Pran Nath was a Hindustani classical singer and teacher of the Kirana gharana , with a successful American career.-Early life:...
Kiranic
Kirana Gharana
Kirana Gharana is one of the most prolific Hindustani khyal gharanas.-History:The name of this school of music derives from Kirana or Kairana, a town and tehsil of Muzzafarnagar District in Uttar Pradesh...
vocals.
Discography
- 1977 Vernal Equinox
- 1978 Earthquake Island
- 1980 Fourth World, Vol. 1: Possible Musics with Brian EnoBrian EnoBrian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
- 1981 Fourth World, Vol. 2: Dream Theory in MalayaDream Theory in MalayaDream Theory in Malaya : Fourth World Volume Two is a World music album by Jon Hassell, released in 1981. It is the "sequel" to his collaboration with Brian Eno, Fourth World Vol...
- 1983 Aka / Darbari / Java: Magic Realism
- 1986 Power SpotPower SpotPower Spot is an album by American trumpet player and composer Jon Hassell recorded in 1983 and 1984 and released on the ECM label.-Reception:...
(produced by Brian EnoBrian EnoBrian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno , commonly known as Brian Eno or simply as Eno , is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer and visual artist, known as one of the principal innovators of ambient music.Eno studied at Colchester Institute art school in Essex,...
/ Daniel LanoisDaniel LanoisDaniel Lanois born September 19, 1951 in Hull, Quebec) is a Canadian record producer, guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter. He has released a number of albums of his own work and has produced albums for a wide variety of artists, including Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Peter Gabriel, Emmylou Harris, Willie...
) - 1987 The Surgeon of the Nightsky Restores Dead Things by the Power of Sound
- 1988 Flash of the Spirit
- 1990 City: Works of Fiction (All Saints RecordsAll Saints RecordsAll Saints Records is a British independent record label. It was established in 1991 by Dominic Norman-Taylor. They have published Ambient music from the likes of Brian Eno or Biosphere.-History:...
) - 1994 Dressing for Pleasure
- 1995 Sulla Strada (release of soundtrack from 1982)
- 1998 The Vertical Collection
- 1999 Fascinoma
- 2005 Magic Realism, Vol. 2: Maarifa Street
- 2009 Last Night the Moon Came Dropping Its Clothes in the Street
Collaborations
- 2000 Hollow Bamboo with Ry CooderRy CooderRyland Peter "Ry" Cooder is an American guitarist, singer and composer. He is known for his slide guitar work, his interest in roots music from the United States, and, more recently, his collaborations with traditional musicians from many countries.His solo work has been eclectic, encompassing...
and Ronu MajumdarRonu MajumdarRonu Majumdar is a noted Indian flautist in the Hindustani Classical Music tradition.-Early life and training:Born in Varanasi on June 22, 1963, Ranendranath Majumdar, popularly known as Ronu was trained under his father, Dr. Bhanu Majumdar, and later learned vocal music with the late Pt. Laxman...
(bansuriBansuriThe bansuri is a transverse alto flute of Bangladesh, India and Nepal made from a single hollow shaft of bamboo with six or seven finger holes. An ancient musical instrument associated with cowherds and the pastoral tradition, it is intimately linked to the love story of Krishna and Radha, and is...
)