Joe Fonda
December 2000
Biography
INTERVIEW
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Discography
Unsung Recordings
Reviewed By
Robert Spencer
Other Fonda
Reviews @ AAJ
Evolution
Full Circle Suite
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About Joe Fonda
By Nils Jacobson
(for more information, please refer to Robert Spencer's excellent January 1999 story at http://www.allaboutjazz.com/artists/fonda.htm)
Joe Fonda, a 46 year old resident of upstate New York, picked up his first bass guitar at the age of ten. He gigged in local bands until his two-year stint at Boston's Berklee School of Music from '73 to '75. During this period, he discovered jazz and switched to the upright bass. Shortly thereafter, he began to search for ways of incorporating traditional jazz with the 'New Thing.' His first record as a leader was the 1976 quartet date Looking for the Lake. After moving to Connecticut, Fonda joined up with the Creative Musicians Improvisers Forum, a local group started by Wadada Leo Smith and Bobby Naughton. The CMIF featured some of the most creative American jazz talent of the time, spurring Fonda on to explore the freer side of his playing. During this period, Fonda made an appearance on the '82 CMIF record The Sky Cries the Blues and Smith's '83 tribute record Procession of the Great Ancestry.
Throughout the '90s Joe Fonda branched out, dramatically increasing the level and diversity of his recorded output. Defining moments of the last decade include the 1990 release Today This Moment with the Mosaic Sextet (which reappeared on record ten years later). The rhythm section of the Mosaic Sextet (Fonda, pianist Michael Stevens, and drummer Harvey Sorgen) went on to form Fonda's primary creative working unit, the Fonda/Stevens Group--also including saxophonist Mark Whitecage and trumpeter Herb Robertson. The FSG made five records, starting in 1995. Meanwhile, Fonda renewed his association with Anthony Braxton, whom he met briefly during his early '80s CMIF period. Joe Fonda appears on a number of Braxton releases from the middle '90s (including a 1995 duo record) and has continued his creative association with Braxton through the present. Meanwhile, he rediscovered the electric bass, touring and playing on a couple of mid-'90s records with the blues group Sweet Daddy Cool Breeze.
Recent projects of interest include Fonda's extended ensemble with (among others) tap dancer Brenda Bufalino and vocalist Vickie Dodd, who help emphasize Fonda's multidisciplinary approach to improvised music. During 1999, Fonda performed in European duo concerts with Shanghai guzheng player Xu Fengxia. The duo recorded Distance, a peculiar but successful multi-cultural combination of free improvisation with traditional Chinese music. He returned to the original configuration of the Mosaic Sextet and has recently been active in a new quartet called Conference Call, with recurrent collaborator Michael Stevens as well as Gebhard Ullmann and Matt Wilson.
Read Nils Jacobson's (December 2000) interview with Joe Fonda.
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