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"The biggest surprise of the year is John Zorn's beautiful Christmas CD. Zorn has hand picked seven of his favorite Christmas songs, penned two lovely originals and they are performed here in classic Dreamers style with plenty of exciting solos, exotic...
Label  Tzadik

Bill Frisell: Guitar
Gyan Riley: Guitar
Julian Lage: Guitar

“This is the fifth CD of new music written expressly for the all-star guitar trio of Bill Frisell, Julian Lage and Gyan Riley. Here Zorn draws inspiration from the enigmatic tales of Argentine philosopher/ writer Jorge Luis Borges. Like a collection of short stories, each composition is a miniature world in itself and touches on philosophy and mysticism as well as music. Blending folk, classical, jazz, bluegrass, world music...
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"Inspired by the spiritual mythology of William Blake, A Vision in Blakelight is the latest in Zorn’s continuing series of 21st century mystical works. With a cinematic sweep reminiscent of his best film scores the music is alternately romantic...
Label  Tzadik

"In an easy listening mode, Alhambra Love Songs is Zorn’s touching and lyrical ode to the San Francisco/Bay Area and the wonderful artists who have made it their home. Including tributes to artists as diverse as Vince Guaraldi, Clint Eastwood, David...
Label  Tzadik

''Here is a side of Zorn's work that has pretty much remained hidden -- his compositions for classical chamber ensembles. This CD marks the first in a series documenting these pieces, commissioned by some of the world's leading ensembles and appearing ...
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''Written for piano soloist, six boy sopranos and full orchestra, Aporias is John Zorn's most accomplished composition to date. This monumental piece, part piano concerto, part Requiem has been universally hailed by performers, composers and audience a...
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A reissue of a very rare early 80's double album with over 60' of bonus material, & featuring an all star band of George Lewis, Zorn, Wayne Horvitz, Mark Kramer, Eugene Chadbourne, Bill Laswell, Tom Cora, David Moss, etc! [Tzadik]
Label  Tzadik

This title is more expensive due to the significant and special deluxe packaging involved: the CD is inside a cardboard box that includes two thick booklets. " Zorn continues his intense new rock direction with a second release by the dynamic all star...
Label  Tzadik

“Jay Campbell (JACK Quartet) and Michael Nicolas (Brooklyn Rider) are two of the greatest cellists in new music. Long-time members of Zorn’s inner circle, here they perform four compositions written expressly for them. Featuring two works for solo cello and two works for cello and rhythm section, the music is filled with spectacular leaps, intense textures, dizzying tremolos, hypnotic ostinatos, scordatura and more! As always, Zorn pushes the envelope of what is technically possible on the instrument...
Label  Tzadik

John Medeski: Clavinet, Organ
Kenny Grohowski: Drums
Matt Hollenberg: Guitar

"Baphomet is a masterpiece! One epic 40-minute long-form composition touching upon all of Zorn's musical obsessions from classical atonality, minimalism, jazz, metal, punk, funk, improvisation, exotica and more.
Passionately performed by John Medeski, Matt Hollenberg and Kenny Grohowski, the music has a dramatic cinematic expanse and is filled with new sounds, unexpected directions, virtuosic solos, bizarre
Label  Tzadik

“From 2015–2017, in the midst of an historic creative high, Zorn wrote and recorded no less than six CDs of music for “Simulacrum,” his most powerful and intense 21st century ensemble; the music then became a project for live performance.
This concert from July 2019 finds the band at their blazing best, performing compositions from four different “Simulacrum” releases. No one blends metal and jazz quite like Zorn (he’s been doing it since the late 1980s) and these mind-bendingly intense performances..
Label  Tzadik

“Two 20-minute compositions scored for jazz piano trio, "Calculus" is a complex and exhilarating display of instrumental virtuosity at its most extreme. Drawing upon all of Zorn's musical obsessions, from thorny atonality to touching minimalism, burning jazz, funk, folk, exotica, ambient, noise and more, this is some of the most ambitious and expansive music ever created for jazz piano trio. Passionately performed by Brian Marsella, Trevor Dunn and Kenny Wollesen, "Calculus" is an outrageous and...
Label  Tzadik

'Featuring the Mondrian Quartet, The Asko Ensemble with Stephen Ashbury conducting, Tomoko Mukaiyama, Arnold Marinissen, Rick Huls, Ina Hesse, Niek Wijns, Erno Hartsuiker. Passionate performances of John Zorn's exciting chamber music by some of the gre...
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“Chaos Magick is a contemporary magical practice based on the ideas of Austin Osman Spare.
Remarkably inclusive, it embraces and has influenced the work of William Burroughs, Robert Anton Wilson, Aleister Crowley and many others. Inspired by these magical practices, Zorn enlists the three members of his most powerful 21st century ensemble Simulacrum with special guest Brian Marsella on electric piano into this eclectic new quartet Chaos Magick. A fast moving, improvi-sational and intensely focused...
Label  Tzadik

Composed throughout 2001 and previewed at the prestigious venue BargeMusic, Chimeras is a major new chamber work by John Zorn. Loosely inspired by Schoenbergs masterwork Pierrot Lunaire, and scored for the same small ensemble (pluspercussion), each of ...

"Newly revised, this is the definitive version of a Zorn masterpiece! Loosely inspired by the remarkable worlds of Henry Darger, Lewis Carroll and Unica Zürn which throw childlike innocence against a backdrop of violence and perversion, Chimeras is one...
Label  Tzadik

"A fabulous and multifaceted suite celebrating the vibrant Italian dramatic form Commedia dell’arte that began in the 16th century and flourishes to this day. The classic archetypical characters Harlequin, Colombina, Scaramouch, Pulcinella and Pierrot are evoked in five compositional miniatures for small chamber ensembles: brass quintet, cello quartet, piano trio, vocal quartet and woodwinds. Premiered at the Guggenheim Museum in early 2016, the music contains some of Zorn’s finest writing and is a...
Label  Tzadik
UPC  702397834724

"Radical in both conception and execution, Zorn’s studio compositions are among his most personal and unique creations. Owing as much to film as to any musical model, these evocative postmodern tone poems have been described as cinema for your ears...
Label  Tzadik

"Zorn’s work has been deeply influenced by the work of Gysin and Burroughs, beginning in the late ’60s when he first became aware of their art, writing and revolutionary techniques of third mind collaboration. Dreamachines celebrates this connection...
Label  Tzadik
UPC  702397830825

''France has been the birthplace of some of the greatest creative minds of the 20th century. Duras:Duchamp is a tribute to two timeless figures who have forever changed our view of the world. Over 30 minutes in length, 'Duras' is a major new compositio...
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"Composed, recorded and originally released in Japan in 1992, Elegy is one of Zorn's most important "file-card" compositions. Drawing inspiration from the writings of Jean Genet, it creates a mysterious musical world of erotic perversion, blending rock...
Label  Tzadik

“Featuring the fabulous virtuoso pianist Stephen Gosling, Encomia is a collection of tributes to many of Zorn’s musical heroes.
The first Book of Preludes consists of three impressionistic pieces in the tradition of Debussy and Ravel that pay tribute to the legendary ballet dancer Nijinsky, the author Novalis creator of the prose poem, and the Hellenistic 3rd century poet Nossis.
Encomia is a suite of tributes to five of Zorn’s musical heroes that run the gamut of styles from minimalism to...
Label  Tzadik

"Twelve bizarre compositional miniatures for the blazing duo of Marc Ribot and Trevor Dunn combining classical 12-tone lyricism with rock intensity and improvisational madness. Jumping from composition to improvisation so seamlessly that it is often...
Label  Tzadik

This set - in addition to the music contained therein - is in a hugely deluxe and nice package which includes a photobook.
"Structured as a colorful tribute to women in the Arts, Femina is a triumphant return to the file card technique that has prod
Label  Tzadik

''Zorn's first soundtrack in three years is a dark and moody setting for a controversial documentary about the Gay Hasidic community. The score for Trembling Before G-D features two of the most inventive and creative musicians out of the burgeoning Bro...
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Film and film music has had a tremendous impact on the life and work of composer John Zorn, and his own soundtrack work reflects his affinity, love for and deep knowledge of the medium. As of this writing he has released sixteen volumes of film music-t...
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''This original installment of the FilmWorks Series presents three scores ranging from punk-rockabilly (featuring the nasty guitars of Bob Quine, Marc Ribot and Arto Lindsay); a jazzy Bernard Herrmann fantasy; to a quirky classical/improv/world music a...
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''A dark and brooding work, exquisitely recorded for an untitled Walter Hill film.'' With Cyro Baptista, Anthony Coleman, Carol Emanuel, Andy Haas, Jim Pugliese, Marc Ribot & David Shea. [Tzadik]

''Contains 25 cues commissioned by Portland's vanguard advertising agency Weidman & Kennedy for 15-to-60 second TV commercials directed by, among others, Goddard, Cronenberg, Sven Nykquist and Industrial Light & Magic. Also included on this incredible ...
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''Focuses on his work in the intriguing S&M film genre. Included here is a solo sampler composition for Mn Sarah's A Lot Of Fun For Evil One, a hypnotic trance piece for KimSu Theiler's Pueblo, a suite and variations for solo piano from Hiroke Yuichi's...
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''Forty-eight sound cues for Japan's leading gayporno director, Oki Hioyuki....mixes together world beat, surf music, hard rock, ambient industrial noise, classical, jazz and just about every other genre you can think of in a bizarre sound world for an...
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''Three very different scores for three very differentfilms all recorded in the first months of 1996. Happy-go-lucky surf rock grooves, modern classical improvisational madness and a dark electro-acoustic construct using the sounds of water, fire and w...

''The holy grail of Zornthologists is finally available in a newly mastered definitive version. Released in Japan for only a few short months in 1990, this is the original music Zorn created for a series of four shorts by one of Japan's most endearing ...
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''Zorn's Masada music has never sounded as beautiful or as evocative as in this recording originally created for Port Of Last Resort -- a film documentary about the Jewish refugees who escaped Nazi Germany by resettling to Shanghai. Augmenting the exci...
Label  Tzadik
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''Hypnotic, sensual and evocative music for Martina Kudlaceks brilliant and detailed documentary on the life and work of underground film legend Maya Deren. Mixing myth and ritual with avant-garde dance and film techniques, Maya forged a creative lang...
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The latest volume in a continuing series documenting Zorns varied and creative work for film features one of his most popular ensemblesthe Masada String Trio. Feldman, Friedlander and Cohen are not only brilliant soloists, but also sensitive ensemble p...
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The popular Filmworks series is a microcosm of the Zorn universe, following his maturing as a composer and his ever-widening musical interests. The music of Volume 12, all recorded in the space of a few weeks (March/April 2002,) is as varied as the fil...

2002 proves to be a watershed year for Zorn, with this being his fifth film score in three months. Here, a taste of Ennio Morricone, Astor Piazzola, French musette and Nino Rota make up what is perhaps his greatest film score to date. At times bizarre,...
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With Marc Ribot on classical guitar, Kenny Wollesen on vibes, Trevor Dunn on acoustic bass, Cyro Baptista on percussion and Ganda Suthivarakom on vocals. "In a Martin Denny mold, Zorn has created a beautiful and exotic soundtrack with lyricism and a wr...

Working fast and loose with a small unit of close friends, Zorn has created a sensitive and intimate score for a dynamic new documentary film on a controversial subject: the rise of anti semitism after 9/11. Featuring hypnotic grooves and ominous moods...
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Featuring two members of the exciting trio Rashanim with drum master Kenny Wollesen and Zorn himself on sax, this is a poignant and varied score for a new documentary about elusive film maverick Marie Menken who was a close friend of Andy Warhol, Kenne...
Label  Tzadik

For Oren Rudavskys new romantic comedy, Zorn has put together a new quartet with a fresh new sound. Drawing upon the modern tango of Piazzolla with a touch of minimalism, this dynamic quartet of violin, accordion, vibes and bass is modern instrumental ...
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"This twentieth volume of John Zorn’s exciting FilmWorks series features the fabulous accordionist Rob Burger and harpist Carol Emanuel accompanied by the world acclaimed Masada String Trio performing music for a documentary on the 19th century Jewish...
Label  Tzadik

"2008 proves a busy year for Zorn and film, with this, his third release of soundtrack music. FilmWorks XXIcontains two very different film scores for two very different movies—one, a bit of French S/M erotica and the other a documentary about the...
Label  Tzadik

One of the strangest films Zorn has ever scored (and that’s saying a LOT), The Last Supper is a science fiction/art film of wild imagination and style. The brainchild of French director Arno Bouchard, the film combines primal ritual with futuristic...
Label  Tzadik

"Eleven cues recorded for a striking documentary focusing on the life of controversial Mexican dictator Plutarco Elias Calles who was called everything from a nunburner to the father of modern Mexico. Beautiful and dramatic, the music is scored for...
Label  Tzadik

��5{���������the last minute to score this bizarre and fascinating black comedy out of the Netherlands, Zorn responded to the stark black and white cinematography by turning in this intimate and moody score for piano trio. Brilliantly performed by Rob...
Label  Tzadik

"The first FilmWorks CD in almost three years (and perhaps the very last in the series) features three radically different musics for solo piano. Commissioned to create music for video installations in Moscow’s Museum of Jewish History, Zorn has...
Label  Tzadik
UPC  702397830528

''A peek into the secret world of a teenage weirdo, revealing the early seeds that developed into the composer's later dementia. Private tapes, home recordings and candid notes.'' [Tzadik]

Craig Taborn: Piano
Christian McBride: Drums
Tyshawn Sorey: Drums
"For one of the last CDs in the Book of Angels series Zorn has put together an astonishing all-star piano trio featuring three of the most powerful and respected musicians in the jazz/new music scene: Craig Taborn, Christian McBride and Tyshawn Sorey. Diving into eight tunes from Zorn’s mystical Masada project they take off in flights of melodic, rhythmic and harmonic fancy that will make your head spin. Visceral and virtuosic.
Label  Tzadik