Jazz Articles about Bill Dixon

Bill Dixon: Tapestries for Small Orchestra

by Nic Jones
November 23, 2009

Bill Dixon Tapestries For Small Orchestra Firehouse 12 2007

When this double-CD/single-DVD set hits the market in November 2009, trumpeter Bill Dixon will be 84 years old. In an ideal world--and on the basis of this release that's the world Dixon inhabits--age wouldn't be an issue. His work is that of a questing spirit not in thrall to the ageing process. Dixon's life and music were celebrated at the Vision Festival in 2007, but ...

Bill Dixon: In Medias Res

by Clifford Allen
September 15, 2009

Trumpeter and composer Bill Dixon is one of those rare figures in creative music who was both there as it took its initial steps and currently remains at the forefront of contemporary improvisation. In the last two years, he has directed or co-led orchestral configurations and recorded and performed with hand-picked small groups of international renown. The modern brass language and its expansion of vocal sounds into areas hitherto rarely occupied by any instrument certainly are reflected in Dixon's years ...

Bill Dixon: 17 Musicians in Search of a Sound: Darfur

by AAJ Italy Staff
September 15, 2008

Tra i musicisti più originali e - tutto sommato - largamente sottovalutati nell'ambito del jazz meno convenzionale, il trombettista Bill Dixon [mitico agitatore della October Revolution in Jazz del 1964] ha trovato di recente, ormai ultraottantenne, una rinnovata visibilità, dapprima come ospite di Rob Mazurek e della sua Exploding Star Orchestra, ora con la riproposizione su disco di un lavoro commissionato dal New York State Music Fund e eseguito in occasione del Vision Festival del 2007. Diciassette musicisti sotto la ...

Bill Dixon: 17 Musicians in Search Of A Sound: Darfur

by Mark Corroto
August 26, 2008

Unlike bassist Henry Grimes, Bill Dixon was never lost. Maybe his absence over the last 15 years was because he didn't want to be found. After the trumpeter, born in 1925, pioneered the New Thing jazz of the 1960s, including the October Revolution festival and the Jazz Composer's Guild, he dropped from the spotlights to teach for 30 years at Bennington College. While his recorded output has been spotty, adventurous listeners certainly treasure Vade Mecum I (1994) and II (1996) ...

Bill Dixon - Rob Mazurek: Bill Dixon with Exploding Star Orchestra

by AAJ Italy Staff
August 18, 2008

Bill Dixon è una di quelle rare icone del free jazz ancora viventi le cui registrazioni (una rarità!) si fanno ogni volta, grandemente, apprezzare. L’ultimo lavoro del trombettista americano, uscito per la Thrill Jockey, è una sorta di grande sinfonia orchestrale in tre atti, frutto della collaborazione con il cornettista Rob Mazurek e la sua Exploding Star Orchestra. Le traiettorie musicali di Dixon e Mazurek, incontratisi al Guelph International Jazz Festival in Ontario (Canada) nel 2006 per un workshop e ...

Bill Dixon: 17 Musicians in Search of a Sound: Darfur

by John Sharpe
August 8, 2008

Trumpeter Bill Dixon works with an orchestral conception, even when playing solo, so it is fascinating to hear what happens when he has 17 musicians at his disposal. Dixon first came to prominence as the organizer of the 1964 October Revolution in Jazz, and later taught at the prestigious Bennington College in a near 30 year tenure. Few of his large ensemble works have made it to disc, but this piece, commissioned by Arts For Arts, and recorded on its ...

Bill Dixon: 17 Musicians In Search Of A Sound: Darfur

by Nic Jones
June 17, 2008

If there's an opposite of aging that isn't growing ever youthful then Bill Dixon's got it. It comes here in music of infinite color, played by an ensemble entirely empathetic with his aims and intentions yet still capable of putting some personal stamp on it. As such it gets to grips, in no uncertain terms, with one of the perennial paradoxes of creative music.

It's clear, on something like “In Search Of A Sound," that instrumental color must have been ...