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Musician

David Amram

David Amram - © Dough Bowman

born on 17/11/1930 in Philadelphia, PA, United States

David Amram

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

David Amram

David Amram (born November 17, 1930) is an American composer, conductor, multi-instrumentalist, and author. As a classical composer and performer, his integration of jazz (including being one of the first noted as an improvising jazz French hornist[1]), folkloric and world music has led him to work with the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Lionel Hampton, Willie Nelson, Langston Hughes, Charles Mingus, Pepper Adams, Leonard Bernstein, Sir James Galway, Tito Puente, Mary Lou Williams, Joseph Papp, Arthur Miller, Arturo Sandoval, Stan Getz, Pete Seeger, Elia Kazan, Christopher Plummer, Ingrid Bergman, Odetta, Lord Buckley, Dustin Hoffman, Steve Allen, Machito, Earl "Fatha" Hines, Allen Ginsberg, Nina Simone, Gregory Corso, Bob Dylan, Steve Goodman, Gerry Mulligan, Sonny Rollins, T.S. Monk, Hunter S. Thompson, Johnny Depp, Levon Helm, Betty Carter and Jack Kerouac. In the early 1950s, he was encouraged to pursue his unique path by mentors Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, the New York Philharmonic's conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos, Miles Davis, Aaron Copland, Gunther Schuller, and visual artists Jackson Pollock, Joan Mitchell, Willem de Kooning and Franz Kline. Today, as he has for over 50 years, Amram continues to compose music while traveling the world as a conductor, soloist, bandleader, visiting scholar, and narrator in five languages.

David is mentioned in the popular Raffi song "Peanut Butter Sandwich", in the line "one for me and one for David Amram"

Biography

David Amram has composed more than 100 orchestral and chamber music works, written many scores for Broadway theater and film, including the scores for the films Splendor in the Grass and The Manchurian Candidate; two operas, including the Holocaust opera The Final Ingredient, a comic opera Twelfth Night with a libretto by Joseph Papp; and the score for the 1959 film Pull My Daisy, narrated by novelist Jack Kerouac. He is also the author of three books: Vibrations, an autobiography; Offbeat: Collaborating With Kerouac, a memoir; and Upbeat: Nine Lives of a Musical Cat, all published by Paradigm Publishers. He is currently writing his fourth book, "David Amram: The Next 80 Years," to be published in 2014.

Along with Julius Watkins, Amram is considered a pioneer of jazz French horn. He also plays piano, numerous flutes and whistles, percussion, and dozens of folkloric instruments from 25 countries, as well as being an improvisational lyricist. Since working with Leonard Bernstein, (who chose him as The New York Philharmonic's first composer-in-residence in 1966[1]), he has been one of BMI's twenty most performed composers of concert music of the last thirty years.

Some of Amram's most critically acclaimed recent orchestral works include Giants of the Night, a concerto for flute and orchestra (commissioned and premiered by Sir James Galway in 2002); Symphonic Variations on a Song by Woody Guthrie,[2] (commissioned by the Woody Guthrie Foundation and premiered in 2007); and Three Songs: A Concerto for Piano and Orchestra (written for and premiered by pianist Jon Nakamatsu in 2009).[3] Currently Amram is working on a new orchestral piece, a new chamber work, and is participating in releases of a new series of CDs of his orchestral chamber music and jazz compositions. Violin virtuoso Elmira Darvarova and members of the New York Philharmonic and Metropolitan Opera Orchestra participated in the annual New York Chamber Music Festival, performing an evening of Amram's chamber works at Symphony Space in New York City, to be released as a CD in 2013. Amram guest conducted the Colorado Symphony Orchestra in Denver in a program which included his "Symphonic Variations on a Song by Woody Guthrie" and "Theme and Variations on Red River Valley," for flute and strings, both of which will appear on a new CD of Amram's music in 2013. The Boston Symphony's classical saxophonist Kenneth Radnofsky has commissioned Amram to compose a new work, "Greenwich Village Portraits," to be premiered worldwide February 1, 2014, by forty different saxophone soloists in forty different venues, sponsored by The Worldwide Concurrent Premieres and Commissioning Funds, Inc. There are plans to release a CD of Amram's symphonic and chamber compositions for saxophone with Radnosky as the soloist in 2013. Radnofsky also appears with Sir James Galway, Pete Seeger, Kurt Elling, Buck Henry, Tiokaskin Ghost Horse, Floyd Red Crow Westerman, David Broza, Candido, Bobby Sanabria, the Queens College Orchestra (conducted by Maurice Peress and Candido), singers and players from the LSU Opera, and other artists, in Lawrence Kraman's new documentary feature film David Amram: The First 80 Years. Amram also appears in Andrew Zuckerman's book and new feature film documentary Wisdom: The Greatest Gift One Generation Can Give To Another, as one of the worlds 50 Elder Thinkers and Doers, and his instructional video, Origins of Symphonic Instruments, released by Educational Video, is shown in over 6,000 schools throughout the United States and Canada. Amram's many honors include the borough president of Brooklyn's creating David Amram Day in 2009, celebrating Amram's 29 years as the Brooklyn Philharmonic's conductor and narrator for free school, community, and parks concerts, pioneering world music and soloists of many genres with the European classics presented by the Brooklyn Academy of Music.

The Music Division of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center has acquired the complete archive of David Amram's manuscripts, scores, recordings, videos, photographs, and artwork. There are plans for an exhibition, and the archive provides the opportunity for scholars and the general public to study his work. All of his concert music is published by C. F. Peters Corporation. Douglas A. Yeager Productions Ltd represents Amram for all of his live appearances and residencies.

Recent Awards

  • On November 16, 2011, Amram was inducted into the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame and given their Jay McShann Lifetime Achievement Award for his sixty year career as one of the first jazz French hornists, a multi-instrumentalist, a pioneer of world music, a scat singer, the creator with author Jack Kerouac of Jazz Poetry in 1957, and one of the first conductors to bring the worlds of jazz and classical music together during the past fifty years.
  • On November 19, 2011, Amram was awarded the 1st Annual Bruce Ricker Lifetime Achievement Award, presented to him by Clint Eastwood's editor Joel Cox. under the auspices of The Paso Digital Film Festival.
  • On November 10, 2012, Amram was the recipient of the second annual Pete and Toshi Seeger Power of Song Award at Symphony Space in New York City, in a gala evening presented by Peter Seeger's Clearwater Foundation.
  • Amram is also the recipient of six honorary Doctorates.

Discography

As leader

Year Album Personnel Label
1957 Jazz Studio No. 6: The Eastern Scene Decca Records
1961 Jazz Portrait Bobby Jaspar, Harold Land, George Barrow Decca Records
1971 No More Walls Jerry Dodgion, Pepper Adams, Candido, Flying Fish/Rounder Records
1972 Subway Night RCA Records
1977 Havana/New York Flying Fish/Rounder Records
1977 Triple Concerto Flying Fish/Rounder Records
1980 At Home/Around the World Flying Fish/Rounder Records
1982 Latin Jazz Celebration Joe Wilder, Jimmy Knepper, Steve Berrios, George Barrow, Pepper Adams, Jerry Dodgion, Duduka Fonseca, Machito, Victor Venegas, Candido Elektra/Musician
1990 Autobiography Flying Fish/Rounder Records
1995 Pull My Daisy Premier Records
1996 Final Ingredient: An Opera of the Holocaust Premier
1999 Southern Stories Chrome Records
2001 Spirit: A Tribute to Jack Kerouac
2002 On the Waterfront Varèse Sarabande
2004 The Manchurian Candidate Varèse Sarabande
2011 David Amram Poetry Jam Casey Cyr, Steve Dalachinsky, Albert Kausch, Richard Lee Martin, Lee Ranaldo, Ron Whitehead Calque Cinema
2014 The Young Savages - Original Soundtrack Harold Land Intrada

As sideman

Selected recordings of Amram's classical compositions

  • 1993: David Amram An American Original (Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, cond. Richard Aulden Clark)
    • American Dance Suite: Cheyenne, Blues, Cajun
    • Theme and Variations on "Red River Valley" for Flute & Strings (Julius Baker, soloist)
    • Travels for Trumpet & Orchestra: Taos, Blues & Variations, Taxim
    • Three Songs for America: Texts by John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., Robert F. Kennedy
  • 1995: David Amram: Three Concertos (Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, cond. Richard Aulden Clark)
    • Concerto for Violin and Orchestra (Charles Castleman, soloist)
    • Honor Song for Sitting Bull, for Cello and Orchestra (Nathaniel Rosen, soloist)
    • Concerto for Bassoon and Orchestra (Kenneth Pasmanick, soloist)
  • 1997: New York Legends: Philip Myers, Principal Horn, New York Philharmonic
    • Three Songs for Marlboro, for Horn and Cello
  • 1997: The Nashville Symphony, cond. Kenneth Schermerhorn
    • Kokopelli: A Symphony in Three Movements
  • 2004: American Classics David Amram
    • Songs of the Soul: A Symphony in Three Movements (Berlin Radio Orchestra, cond. Christopher WIlkins)
    • Shir L'erev Shabbat: Excerpts from a Friday Evening Service (cond. Ken Keisler)
    • Excerpts from The Final Ingredient, an Opera of the Holocaust (cond. Ken Keisler)
  • 2006: John Cerminaro: A Life of Music, Historic Live Performances
    • Concerto for Horn and Wind Symphony (John Cerminaro, soloist, Juilliard Wind Orchestra, cond. James Chambers)

Bibliography

  • 2001: Vibrations: The Adventures and Musical Times of David Amram (Thunder's Mouth Press) ISBN 1-56025-308-8
  • 2003: Offbeat: Collaborating with Kerouac (Paradigm) ISBN 1-56025-460-2
  • 2007: Upbeat: Nine Lives of a Musical Cat (Paradigm) ISBN 978-1-59451-424-1
  • Douglas Brinkley wrote in the introduction to Vibrations: The Adventures and Musical Times of David Amram and Audrey Sprenger wrote the Afterwards (Paradigm, 2008)

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 Ginell, Richard. [David Amram at All Music Guide David Amram: Biography]. Allmusic. Retrieved on October 17, 2011.
  2. Bratman, David (October 2, 2007). Variations on This Land. San Francisco Classical Voice. Retrieved on October 17, 2011.
  3. 2008 2009 Season. Symphony Silicon Valley. Retrieved on October 17, 2011.

External links

This page was last modified 08.04.2014 13:56:14

This article uses material from the article David Amram from the free encyclopedia Wikipedia and it is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.