* En anglais uniquement
Versatility has characterized the career of
Ari Brown, a Chicago-based reedman and occasional pianist who plays hard bop and post-bop as convincingly as he plays avant-garde jazz. After growing up on the city's South Side and graduating from high school in the early '60s,
Brown attended Chicago's Wilson College, where he met
Jack DeJohnette,
Henry Threadgill,
Roscoe Mitchell,
Joseph Jarman, and others who would later become members of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM).
Brown played piano in mostly soul and blues bands until 1965, when he took up the sax and starting becoming seriously interested in jazz. In 1971, he joined AACM and made jazz his primary focus.
Brown played sax on a few albums by a little-known group called the Awakening (who included bassist
Rufus Reid), but after losing some teeth in a 1974 auto accident, he gave up playing the sax for about a year and played the piano exclusively.
Brown made a full recovery, made the sax his main instrument once again and went on to work with players ranging from
McCoy Tyner and
Don Patterson to
Sonny Stitt in the 1970s. The Chicagoan also kept busy during the 1980s, recording with
Lester Bowie before being hired by
Von Freeman,
Bobby Watson, and
Anthony Braxton (who hired him for his Charlie Parker Project). It was in 1989 that
Brown began his lucrative membership in
Kahil El'Zabar's
Ritual Trio. But as long a resumé as
Brown had as a sideman, he didn't record as a leader until 1995, when he provided the diverse
Ultimate Frontier for Delmark. ~ Alex Henderson