John Zorn Music

A strong, diverse first entry into his gigantic Film Works series finds the always-eclectic composer offering up an ultra diverse sampler from three of some of Zorn's earliest independent movie scorings. A few tracks are rough around the edges, but when that is not working in any piece's favor, the seemingly unlimited wealth of talented players always working with our warped maestro still usually demands attention. Even if we are listening to a tired blues theme or a standard jazz progression, the variations on these themes remain interesting for the most part still to this day. Hitting a masterful stride with the horn-heavy third act, Zorn proves once again why he is one of the most versatile, edgy, and equipped composers working today.

"Film Works 1986 - 1990" is an anthology of early soundtrack work by John Zorn, collecting soundtracks for three short films and a rightly famous arrangement of "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" together. These days, Zorn has been pumping out a couple or three soundtrack pieces a year, but in the '80s, he was still the duck call guy, and it's intriguing to see his soundtrack work when it was very new to him.

The results are actually, given Zorn's place at the time, remarkably mainstream in their sound. Mind you, this isn't exactly Top 40, but it's a lot less frantic or dense as much of his early work. Expertly performed by some of the best musicians New York City had to offer-- Robert Quine, Bill Frisell, Mark Dresser, Bobby Previte, Wayne Horvitz, David Shea, the list goes on-- Zorn coaxes together a stew that accepts all his musical interests. At it's best, the performances are exciting and diverse (the hardcore punk of the "Main Title" from "White and Lazy", smokey, deep groove guitar jazz on "Seduction", the inexplicable "Theme" from "The Golden Boat" are all good examples), quite frankly at it's worst, the pieces on here are a bit too backgroundish, nothing is really bad. Morricone's infuence sits pretty heavy here, but it is uniquely Zorn.

I tend to find myself preferring Zorn's more recent soundtrack work, where he's shed the Morricone sound and really come into his own, but this is certainly an intriguing and powerful record. Recommended.

This was my first Zorn album. It is amazing. So many styles throughout the album. It really shows his strength as a musician and the deversity of his works. It is a lot easier to get into than some of his other works and I would recommend it to someone interested in checking him out. You get a little bit of everything, metal, jazz, country,classical and world music. Wonderful cd.

Never heard Zorn before, never heard his film music, and curious? This is the one best CD to buy. The music is great and it displays his strengths as a musician. He has a great ear for styles and can produce music in all of them, yet it's more than just mimicry, it's well made music with a strong core and a fine expression. He's an excellent alto player with great hard-bop chops and a nice, biting sound that comes right out of Jackie McLean. He also assembles great ensembles of musicians who have their own distinctive voices that benefit all the work. The music ranges from jazz to rock and beyond, never missing a beat, absolutey assured in everyway, constantly inventive and just great to listen to.

"Film Works II" is the soundtrack to "an untitled film by Walter Hill". It must have been one bizarre movie, because even for Zorn, this is an intensely difficult soundtrack. Using an odd band of percussion (Cyro Baptista and Jim Pugliese), keyboards (Anthony Coleman), harp (Carol Emanuel), didjerido (Andy Haas), guitar or banjo (Marc Ribot) and turntables (David Shea), Zorn builds a dark and moody performance.

Mixing minimalism with funky, driven rhythms, this soundtrack whips towards a frenzy but never quite seems to reach-- the didjerido is central to the performance, providing a bleak counterpoint dialog throughout the performance to the largely percussive framework provided by Baptista and Pugliese, whether in a minimalist vein ("Intro"), a deeply funky groove ("King James") or darkly mixing with percussion ("Pigeons"). These all swirl around the "Arsenal" theme-- a driven percussion statement that once it appears is reprised over and over again throughout the performance in an almost maddening fashion.

Curiously enough, this is the only volume in Zorn's soundtrack series that doesn't include his comments on the music.

Invariably, this one isn't going to win any converts to Zorn, but for those of us already indoctrinated, this is a worthwhile purchase.

Not one of my favorite Zorn records. There are nice moments, and the CD has a nice spare, quiet sound, but hardly ever gets beyond that, which is the big fault. Zorn's style doesn't lend itself to much development, and there is no solid focus at the core of the CD to maintain much interest through an hour or so of this short, whispy bits. The ultimate effect is one of boredom. Any other film music CD of his would be preferable and display the same style that is both over and underdone here.

Walter Hill rejected Elmer Bernstein's original score for his movie Last Man Standing. It was a great score with wonderful themes. He also rejected 3 different scores by James Horner for his movie Streets of Fire. Both these films were eventually scored by Ry Cooder. And in 1992 he kicked out John Zorn's score for his movie Trespass in favor for Cooder again.

A wise choice if there ever was one as Zorn's score is virtually non-existent. This CD is basically 5 minutes of silence with the slightest of sound calling itself a 'score'. Come on! I thought Zorn was a heavy Jazz musician. What's the deal with this score of nothingness?

And why oh why does he think a didgeridoo is appropriate for a film set in an abandoned East St. Louis factory? It's not set in the Austrailian outback! I did appreciate the banjos during the treasure map cue but the next track and every after that is an average of 50 seconds of silence.

Cooder's new score emulates Zorn's (a couple of his beats remain in the film) but gave it a bit more life despite being rather themeless and grungy. His 'King of the Street' theme was brilliance however. And without Walter Hill firing John Zorn it would never have happened.

An absolutely rotten piece of 'music' if there ever was one. And I don't know what the Amazon staff member was listening to, but the Two Interiors cue sounds NOTHING like John Williams' score to Star Wars.

Never, ever, ever buy for any reason, morbid curiousity or not. It's a complete waste of money.

There is LOTS of material on this disc; much of it is dark and brooding, and some of it is quite violent and disturbing. It's the moodiest of the filmworks discs and the most cohesive, since all fifty or so cuts on it were recorded for one film. There are some absolutely brilliant cuts on it, the didjeridu and the jaw harp and other favorite odd instruments are well-used, and, as always, the musicianship is top-notch. If you prefer the cartoonier aspects of Zorn, then I'd pass on this one, but if you're a fan -- this is well worth owning. By the way, I heard a rumor on the wind that this was intended as a soundtrack for Hill's film TRESPASS, but was rejected, in favor of the usual Ry Cooder stuff. That could be hooey, tho'.

I must admit that this is one of my personal Zorn favorites. Using the didjerido as if it's a common instrument provides for a uniform theme througout this album. Highlights include "the Arsenal [dance mix]". This song just rocks. This is one Zorn album you must obtain and appreciate. The great thing about Zorn is, is that you can buy about 10 albums and possess all the music you'll need in your lifetime...this is one of those albums...

One of the more diverse of John Zorn's soundtrack series, "Filmworks III" brings together performances from four very different environments and contains many historically critical pieces.

The first part of the CD is given over to the soundtrack to a movie called "Thieves Quartet". Inspired by Miles Davis' "Escalator to the Scaffolds" soundtrack, the music is by and large highly intriguing loungey jazz, ably performed by Zorn on alto, Dave Douglas on trumpet, Greg Cohen on bass and Joey Baron on drums. A year later, this group would in fact become Masada. Many of the hallmarks of Masada are already present-- dueling improvs ("Kidnapping"), fantastic grooves set up by the rhythm section ("The Caper") and downright fantastic interaction all around ("Bag Man"). Musically, it's not as powerful as Masada, but for its curiosity value, it's worth a listen. The CD next turns over to "Music for Tsunta"-- nine cues for the director of "Cynical Hysterie Hour" featuring largely the same instrumentation. The music is very visual, very over-the-top, and largely driven by Bill Frisell's banjo. The lightness of this seems in clear opposition to the soundtrack to "Hollywood Hotel", a duet between Zorn (on alto) and Marc Ribot (guitar). The two cover ground in Naked City-like fashion, exploring frantic improvs and implied grooves in what is probably my favorite part of the disc. Finally, the album closes with a couple dozen commercial spots done for an advertising house Zorn works with. The music itself is at times intriguing and at times over before you notice, though the sheer diversity of the work here catches your attention, the necessarily short format hinders development of ideas.

While it's not the best of Zorn's work by far in the soundtrack arena, "Filmworks III" has historical value and makes for a decent listen. Recommended for those already immersed in Zorn's soundtrack works, newcomers would probably do better starting with the new Filmworks Anthology or (for a single piece) "Filmworks XIII: Inviation to a Suicide".

This disc is one of the most varied of the FILMWORKS releases. The stuff that will draw most people to it is the Thieves' Quartet material -- tracks from Masada, before they were Masada. Baron, Cohen, Douglas and Zorn are in fine form, and one can easily hear how Masada took off from these beginnings -- anyone could tell that this was a good idea, crying out to be elaborated upon. After that, the "Hollywood Hotel" material would likely be the next big draw, featuring some really snazzy Zorn/Ribot collaborations. The rest of the disc is pretty hard to do justice to in prose; there are a series of cues for Kiriko Kubo cartoons -- she of the Cynical Hysterie Hour, which Zorn also scored (see my review). These aren't fully developed pieces, however, and each lasts only a short while, such that nine pieces of music run together into one three-and-a-half minute "composition." Rounding out the disc are compositions Zorn recorded with hosts of his regulars (Arto Lindsay, Cyro Baptista, and many, many more) for Weiden and Kennedy, an advertising firm who commissioned television commercials from directors like David Cronenberg and Jean Luc Godard. (Amazingly, Zorn got on quite well with Weiden and Kennedy, was treated very respectfully, and seems quite happy with the finished results, as he details in his liner notes, which, as always, are very interesting reading). Many of these pieces, too, only last a few seconds, and end rather jaggedly, but there are several longer takes of some cuts, including a 32-second take on the "Batman" theme that should please Naked City fans. This is NOT my favorite FILMWORKS disc -- it's just a little too uneven for me -- but it's still wonderful stuff.

These obsessive and quietly intense pieces often seem to have more in common with Zorn's `Redbird' and `Duras', and Feldman and Courvoisier's Masada Recital approach than other Filmworks releases which draw upon the Masada Book. Chris Speed's clarinet and Jamie Saft's piano and organ intertwine perfectly to create beautiful, impassioned (and in some places - particularly `Notarikon', `Idalah-Abal' - almost ambient due to Saft's dark organ drone and Speed's abstract, spacious phrasing) music that captures with powerful resonance the desolate anxiety of forbidden gay Orthodox Jewish love.
Saft's readings of Mahshav and Kaporeh for piano are - along with his `Kiev' from `In The Mirror Of Maya Deren' - the most beautiful pieces in Zorn's vast catalog. `Sholom Aleichem' is a brief but stunning Jewish melody for clarinet and piano, again interweaving melancholic yearning and transcendent beauty. `Nigun' is almost hopeful in feel as the two instruments dance delicately around each other.
Although lacking the explosive interplay that characterises so much of Zorn's work - particularly where the two Masada Books are concerned - in these subtle, haunting pieces - often reminiscent of Satie and Morton Feldman in their understated precision of expression - Speed and Saft's intensity of focus draws meaning from each and every note and results in a quiet, powerful, yet sadly unsung Radical Jewish masterpiece.

I'm big Zorn fan, but I was really disappointed with this record. It could be almost as magical, as dark and passionate as Bar Kokhba, same tunes organ and clarinet, but it's far away from the original. The atmosphere is gone and what's left, is just boring. "Mazel Tov" seems to be a joke, I don't have a problem with Zorn's pastiche and sense of humour, but this version is just stupid. Sorry, my own words hurt me, but this is the firs Zorn record I will get rid of - out of the 50 I already have.

The soundtrack for a movie about homosexuals in the orthodox Jewish community, "Trembling Before G-d" finds John Zorn's filmworks series meeting his Masada songbook halfway. The original impetus to use Zorn for the soundtrack was due to the "Idalah-Abal" performance on "Bar Kokhba"-- as such, Zorn constructed a soundtrack for keyboard (organ and piano courtesy of Jamie Saft) and clarinet (Chris Speed) with occasional contributions from percussionist Cyro Baptista on three pieces and the composer singing (!) one song.

The music itself is nice, flirting with the Masada sound on many tracks (indeed, several are drawn from the Masada songbook) and a sort of droning klezmer feel on several others. By and large, it's a pretty dark piece, with the clarinet mournful and the organ dirge-like ("Idalah-Abal", "Maskil") with a few pieces thrown in to shake things up, most notably "Simen Tov/Mazel Tov", feautring a bizarre, ranting and rambling vocal from Zorn doubling the clarinet theme statement and the flighty "Notarikon", with its droning organ and bizarre clarinet leads. But these interludes are few and far between, and in fact the problem is that this record is so cohesive and holds together so tightly that the pieces blend one into another-- its often the stuff of pained beauty, and it sounds as if it would go great with the film (I haven't seen), but all in all, it gets a bit monotonous.

Typical of the Zorn Filmworks series, the liner notes include essays by Zorn about the pieces and the director concerning his selection of Zorn for the soundtrack and the music performed.

Overall, this is not one of the essential entries in the Filmworks catalog-- interested parties in learning of Zorn's soundtrack pieces should check the sublime "Filmworks XIII- Invitation to a Suicide", leave this one for later or for when the craving for more Masada material is too extraordinary and you've bought the rest.

One of the most varied soundtracks in John Zorn's "Filmworks" series, "Filmworks V: Tears of Ecstacy" was recorded for a Japanese movie that seemed to be concerned with conceptual filmmaking-- the movie consisted of roughly sixty one minute sections for which Zorn was asked to provide music for in a rather limited timeframe. Zorn (performing on alto sax, prepared piano and samples) is joined by Marc Ribot (guitar), Robert Quine (guitar) and Cyro Baptista (percussion) and for each of the one minute or so tracks (there's 48 of them on the disc), different genres or genre alloys are explored.

So what separates this from Naked City? It's not as carefully planned, that's clear. The music itself is a lot of fun, everything from smokey blues ("Youden Square") to blasts of metal noise ("Cusp") and in between are covered, but it's all quite loose. It's clear it was put together in a hurry, and while the pieces are fun and effective, they by-and-large lack the depth that the Naked City pieces have.

Nonetheless, it's a decent record. If you're really craving more Naked City, this might be a good coda, and if you're into Zorn's film composition, this is a worthwhile endeavor, but by-and-large it's less essential then many other soundtrack pieces.

There's an incredible number of cuts on this disc. Almost all run around a minute long, and feature some of the finest of Zorn's longtime collaborators making very strange, very playful sounds with him in the studio -- experimenting, bringing in unusual instruments, making noise, making music. It's incredibly varied and delightful stuff; the film it's a soundtrack for is apparently a Japanese porno about extraterrestrials with a sexual fetish I won't detail here (since my previous review of this disc seems not to have made it past the editors). I suspect everyone involved had a hoot making it, and it certainly transfers onto the listener: this album is A LOT of fun, and my favorite FILMWORKS release.

A collection of three scores from 1996, "Film Works VI" is one of the most varied albums in John Zorn's soundtrack collection-- the three are unnervingly different from each other.

Four cues for a film called "Anton, Mailman" are included, featuring a band of guitarist Marc Ribot, bassist Greg Cohen and percussionist Cyro Baptista, with Zorn performing on alto sax on one track. It's really quite a pity that both the movie's funding got pulled and there's not more material available, this is among the best work that Zorn has done-- blending surf and Hawaiian music into something quintisentially Zorn, the music works out to be superb, whether it's exemplery slide work from Ribot ("Opening Credits/Hawaiian Postcard") or an uncharacteristically blues solo from Zorn ("Seductress") or just an exposition on mundane life ("Work-a-day World", which sounds exactly like its title), this is some fantastic stuff.

Slightly less intriguing is the score for "Mechanics of the Brain". Featuring (collectively) violinist Mark Feldman, cellist Erik Friedlander, Ribot, Ikue Mori (on drum machines) and Zorn on sound effects, the performance is diverse and varied, stretching from minimalist classical ("Fireworks") to frantic and fractured performance in the Derek Bailey school ("Subliminal Perceptions") to downright bizarre vocalizations ("Pendulum"), it doesn't quite hang together as nicely as the "Anton, Mailman" score, but it is highly engaging.

And speaking of engaging, the oddball score for "The Black Glove" proves to be unexpectedly engaging. Featuring Zorn on "sound design", he essentially produces fire, air and water noises for a good 25 minutes or so. But it has a natural progression and feels coherent and well formed, and really it works better then you'd ever guess.

As a collection, this one works well, and certainly the first score on here is worth the price of the disc. Recommended.

The ANTON, MAILMAN surfy stuff is playful and fun and has great work by a then-ailing Marc Ribot (whose sorry state during the sessions, which were plagued by other mishaps, as well, is told of with humour and warmth by Zorn in his liner notes, which, as always, are articulate and interesting to read). The MECHANICS OF THE BRAIN stuff is more "stringy," in the sense of "strings," and a little darker, though has some cool percussive stuff going on courtesy of the ever-fascinating Ikue Mori. The last track, however, whooshes of noise and wind and ambient sound turned into a lengthy score for a lesbian S and M film, have yet to hold my interest (though the images from the movie in the insert are pretty darn sexy, I s'pose). Despite the delightful ANTON, MAILMAN stuff, I'd make this the LAST Filmworks CD I'd get (and there's only one I haven't heard -- the other S and M one). This, I think, holds even if you like bondage play; being kinky doesn't necessarily mean wanting to listen to ten minutes of wind and background noise. Of course, maybe the cut'll eventually grow on me, like ABSINTHE did, but... well, best to inform you, right?

In late 1988 and 1989, John Zorn recorded music to serve as a soundtrack for four seven minute cartoons ("Cynical Hysterie Hour") by Kiriko Kubo. Released for a moment by CBS then lapsed out of print, the album stayed that way until Zorn was able to successfully negotiate a deal with them to secure its re-release on Tzadik.

Featuring performances by any number of luminaries in the downtown scene (guitarists Bill Frisell, Robert Quine, Marc Ribot, and Arto Lindsay, keyboardist Wayne Horvitz, turntable pioneer Christian Marclay, percussionist Cyro Baptista, drummer Bobby Previte, and the enigmatic electronic musician Ikue Mori, credited here with drum machines), the music is Zorn's most overt tribute to the work of Carl Stalling, although there is a heavy surf influence on the pieces as well. Everything is composed in blocks, with brief, quirky moments full of personality ruling each section. It's quite interesting, and there's some great moments in both composition and performance throughout, although it feels a bit incomplete. This could be because Zorn doesn't do much in terms of self-referentialism on the piece-- typically his soundtrack performances reprise themes, this one doesn't and feels a bit less cohesive for it. Or it could be that this recording is only 25 minutes long.

Like all the filmworks series, the liner notes contain an essay from Zorn about the film it was attached to and about the music itself. This one also adds the amusing anecdote about how Zorn got the rights to release this.

In all, a fine, if brief recording, but Zorn's done better, both in soundtracks and outside.

The fine people at Tzadik were kind enough to inform me that Sony still technically own the rights to this album, and have generously licensed it BACK to Tzadik so they could distribute it. The original pressing of this disc was Zorn's first major label release, made way back in 1989, and achieved some notoriety as such, which I'll explain presently... The disc is comprised of several goofy, cool bits of manic weirdness that have been grouped roughly together into four cuts, assumedly to match four separate episodes of series it was the soundtrack for -- a Japanese TV anime show called, as you may have guessed, THE CYNICAL HYSTERIE HOUR. Kiriko Kubo, the cartoonist/creator, even sings on some of the cuts, and writes some minimal lyrics (nothing intrusive or out-of-place, I assure you; stuff like the assertion, made against the diverse, cheerful, and bizarre background of the music, that she likes icecream -- said, of course, in Japanese). Sony somehow didn't NOTICE what a wonderful CD they had. Despite the presence of Zorn and other regular collaborators of considerable repute (Marc Ribot, Arto Lindsay, Wayne Horvitz, Bill Frisell, Robert Quine, Cyro Baptista, etc., etc.), they ISSUED THE ORIGINAL WITHOUT ANYONE'S NAME ON THE OUTER PACKAGING SAVE KUBO'S, and treated it "merely" as an anime soundtrack, of interest only to Japanese TV viewers. They didn't even market it outside Japan, and let it go out of print almost immediately. It then became, as Tzadik have dubbed it, "the Holy Grail for Zornithologists" until such a time as Zorn got the Tzadik label off the ground and acquired the rights to distribute it himself (for the time being). Really, it's too bad Sony didn't do more with this. The CD is some of the most accessible, listener-friendly, and flat out FUN stuff Zorn and co. have ever recorded, even more listener-friendly than the self-titled NAKED CITY CD or THE BIG GUNDOWN (which both seem pretty accessible to me too, for the record -- if they don't to you, you might want to bear that in mind). The disc's weaknesses, if it has any, lie in it almost being TOO playful for my ears -- I occasionally want to hear Yamantanka Eye shrieking and gibbering psychotically, in the midst of all the fun, or hear oblique references to S and M or death metal or torture or so forth, just to maintain a strong sense of the Zorniness of it all. But Eye isn't on it, and instead of occasional bursts of speedmetal hysteria -- on this album, you get jangly, delirous banjo parts courtesy of Bill Frisell. But really, borderline cute as it sometimes gets, it's all good fun, and well worth having. Anyone who simply loves cartoon music -- any Carl Stalling fans out there -- would doubtlessly grok it, too. Oh, yeah, I suppose I should note that it IS kind of short -- the whole disc runs less than half an hour -- but it's such a jam packed half hour that you won't mind, I promise.

Overall the tracks on this Film Works go beyond haunting into depression.
It seems the compositions strive to be so, so esoteric, but mostly they just barely register a pulse. The music does sway from time to time, but slowly and darkly. "Family Found" is hinted at a on several tracks and there is some pipa-like cello plucking similar to some of Zorn's pipa-works. I like Zorn and most of the Film Works, and this one is okay, but not great. Baptiste, however, truly stands out on track 12, Voudoun.

i'll keep it short,this work is great in it's "smallness" and keen on emotion.you can feel that john has a respect for maya's art,as he expresses it through these touching songs.i haven't heard any of the other of zorn's film works,but if they come close to x,they'd be worth a look!

John Zorn's soundtrack work has over the years produced a number of records of stunning and fragile beauty. With a collection as vast as Zorn's of soundtrack music (sixteen albums worth released with at least one more on the way in 2006), it seems likely that some will get overlooked. When speaking of his best soundtrack work, "Filmworks X: In the Mirror of Maya Deren" does not often get mentioned, but it really should.

Performed ably by Erik Friedlander (cello), Jamie Saft (keyboards) and Cyro Baptista (percussion), with Zorn contributing piano and percussion on a few cuts, the soundtrack is largely romantically tinged themes stated and reprised in a number of formations. "Nostalgia" (peformed by Friedlander and Saft on piano) is the best example of this-- Zorn's melody is fragile and beautiful and Friedlander's performance adds depth and emotion to it. End result-- simply superb music. This is pretty much consistently the story here, whether it be Harold Budd styled ambient ("Drifting"), percussion pieces ("Haiti") or a lilting piano number ("Filming"), the whole record is performed with unusual sensitivity and power.

In short, this is not an album to be overlooked-- one of the best in Zorn's soundtrack catalog. Highly recommended.