# Message to Our Folks: The Art Ensemble of Chicago by Paul Steinbeck: Video

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2017/12/20/message-to-our-folks-the-art-ensemble-of-chicago-by-paul-steinbeck-video/
- Published: 2017-12-20T22:14:41+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**With its multifaceted radicalism, the Art Ensemble of Chicago occupies a singular
niche in the American music timeline. That creative audacity could be found in the
array of sounds the band generated, the philosophical and aesthetic underpinnings
of those sounds, the virtuoso instrumentalism of its members, the self-reliant business
model by which it operated and the theatrical presentation that defined its performances.**

Its origin story dates to 1961, when bassist Malachi Favors, then 34, and saxophonists
Joseph Jarman, 24, and Roscoe Mitchell, 21, each a veteran of the U.S. Armed Forces,
met at Woodrow Wilson Junior College on Chicago’s South Side. In addition to their
music studies under Prof. Richard Wang, who taught the jazz and Euro canons at Wilson
in equal measure, they attended frequent rehearsals in the basement of pianist Muhal
Richard Abrams’ house.

There, they developed the instrumental command and imaginative flexibility needed
to render Abrams’ complex, far-reaching scores—works mixing elements of serial music,
atonality, stark intervals, propulsive rhythms and African and other world-music
motifs.

In 1966, the Roscoe Mitchell Sextet, which included Favors and recent Chicago arrival
Lester Bowie, recorded _Sound_ for the Delmark label. It became a path-breaking 
document, presenting a structure-oriented alternative to the aesthetic of intensity
that defined much “New Thing” expression at the time. In August 1967, that trio 
joined Jarman—who had already performed with John Cage, and was offering performances
around Chicago that incorporated dance, poetry, ritual and Fluxus-influenced theatre—
for the discursive Nessa release _Numbers 1&2_, under Bowie’s name. After the deaths
of his close friends and bandmates Christopher Gaddy (piano) and Charles Clark (
bass) in the late 1960s, Jarman devoted the majority of his time to the now collectively
billed group. Local gigs were scarce, and in June 1969 the four partners traveled
to France, where, over the next two years, the Art Ensemble of Chicago would add
drummer-percussionist Famoudou Don Moye, record 15 albums and perform extensively.
Operating by consensual principles, the AEC, now internationally recognized, retained
this core personnel until 1993, when Jarman took an extended leave of absence, returning
only after Bowie died in 1999.

The AEC’s story could be grist for a creative biopic, but in the meantime, there’s
the well-sourced _Message to Our Folks_, in which Paul Steinbeck—an academic who
earned his Ph.D. at Columbia under Prof. George Lewis, author of the authoritative
AACM history _A Power Stronger Than Itself_—traces this transformative unit’s story
in clear prose. Granted access to the AEC’s archives and full cooperation from surviving
members Jarman, Mitchell and Moye, he supplements Lewis’ narrative with taut, psychologically
perceptive portraits of each AEC protagonist, using their voices to guide the chronology.
Three chapters exhaustively analyze the 1969 album _Message to Our Folks_, the 1972
album _Live at Mandel Hall_ and the 1982 concert video _Live From the Jazz Showcase_,
incorporating information about the AEC’s rehearsal procedures, real-time cuing 
systems and structural thinking.

All in all, _Message to Our Folks_ provides newer admirers with an overview of how
the AEC developed and flourished, while longtime followers attuned to the band’s
message will find much new information.’

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