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Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular MusicA B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y ZECM labelJazz/fusion label formed by Manfred Eicher: first issue '70 was the Mal Waldron trio LP Free At Last. Established U.S. jazzmen and new avant-garde artists were available in Europe; the major labels as usual were doing very little. ECM often used Oslo studios; the company offices now in Munich. More than 200 albums in print by 1989 included items by Sam Rivers, Kenny Wheeler, Azimuth, Miroslav Vitous, John Surman, Dave Holland, Lester Bowie, Paul Bley, much more. The fifteenth anniversary of the label was marked by ten Works LPs, anthologies of ECM artists Pat Metheny, Keith Jarrett, Gary Burton, Jack DeJohnette, Chick Corea, Jan Garbarek, Egberto Gismonti, bassist Eberhard Weber Terje Rypdal multi-instrumentalists Ralph Towner (b 1 March 1940, Chehalis WA). Virtually all the label's artists are also composers; they record for ECM without long-term contracts. Recording quality is very high; many items have won awards. Success was so great that critics complained about slickness, and it is true that ECM contributed more than sleeve graphics to new age music, partly because young European musicians of very high technical accomplishment are playing fusion: Rypdal for example prefers the tone of some rock musicians to that of 'mellow type jazz guitarists', while David Darling (b 4 March 1941, Elkhart IN) plays an eight-string solid-bodied amplified cello of his own design. Some of the music lacks passion to the point of introversion, but much of the catalogue is hardly complacent: Old And New Dreams included ex-Ornette Coleman sidemen Charlie Haden, Dewey Redman, Don Cherry and Ed Blackwell (eponymous debut followed by Playing '82); five ECM sets by the Art Ensemble of Chicago are among their best; Haden's Ballad Of The Fallen '84 is still selling. Of Jarrett's many albums, The Koln Concert '75 had sold a million by 1989. ECM recorded free-form 'classical' composer Steve Reich, breaks new artists every year, e.g. U.S. quartet Everyman Band, whose eponymous debut LP was followed by Without Warning, made '84 in Bearsville, NY. ECM also distributed the Carla Bley/Mike Mantler Watt label. Hal Russell's NRG Ensemble from Chicago was a new signing '91; the ECM New Series had great success with the music of Estonian composer Arvo Pärt, the Georgian Giya Kancheli etc and a Garbarek set with the saxophonist improvising against four-part settings of mediaeval and Renaissance songs. Eicher is never afraid to try anything new; indeed he says he would rather sign an unknown artist and start from scratch. On the other hand the label's first reissue '92 was Jimmy Giuffre 3, 1961, rescuing two beautiful neglected albums. |