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Archie Shepp

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Archie Shepp, born on 24 May 1937 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and raised in Philadelphia, is an American saxophonist, teacher and playwright. He played banjo with his father and studied piano and saxophone. From 1955 to 1959 he studied drama at Goddard College. He then played in the band of the pianist Cecil Taylor. In 1963 his first record under his own name appeared, with the trumpeter Bill Dixon. At the end of 1964 he took part in the sessions for John Coltrane's A Love Supreme and in 1965 he recorded Ascension with him.

Music and breakthrough

In 1965 he made Fire Music, on which his political awareness and his Afrocentric outlook became visible, with a recitation of an elegy for Malcolm X. The Magic of Ju-Ju from 1967 was deeply rooted in African music and used an African percussion ensemble. In 1969 he played at the Pan-African Cultural Festival in Algiers. In 1972 Attica Blues appeared, a response to the uprising at Attica prison, along with The Cry of My People. Shepp also wrote plays, including The Communist and Lady Day: A Musical Tragedy. Later he also recorded blues, ballads and spirituals, such as Goin' Home with Horace Parlan in 1977.

Influence

Shepp became a professor at the University at Buffalo and then, for thirty years, at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He shows how the avant-garde jazz of the 1960s linked music and the struggle for civil rights.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to the opening piece of Fire Music and notice the raw, screaming tone of his tenor saxophone. Try to hear how the horns drown one another out and come together again.

Discography

Studio albums

In School of Rock

The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.

See also

Categories: ArtistsFree jazzSpiritual jazz