Jon Hassell

Born on March 22, 1937, in Memphis, Tennessee, Jon Hassell was an avant-garde trumpeter who blended jazz, electronics and ethnic music (which he referred to as ‘Fourth World Music’). He studied at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester (New York State), where he earned his master's degree. In 1965, he relocated to Cologne, Germany to study under Karlheinz Stockhausen. On his return to the US two years later, he collaborated with minimalist composer and musician Terry Riley and pursued a doctorate in musicology in Buffalo. In 1974, Jon Hassell traveled to India to study Indian classical music with the master Pandit Pran Nath. He applied his musical principles and multiple electronic effects on his first two albums - Vernal Equinox (1977) and Earthquake Island (1978). He collaborated with Brian Eno on Fourth World, Vol. 1: Possible Musics (1980). Jon Hassell followed that up with Dream Theory in Malaya – Fourth World, Vol. 2 (1981) and Aka / Darbari / Java: Magic Realism (1983), released on the Editions EG label. He collaborated with a variety of eclectic artists including Talking Heads, Robert Fripp, David Sylvian, Peter Gabriel, Lloyd Cole & the Commotions, Tears for Fears, k.d. Lang, Jackson Browne, Ry Cooder and Ani DiFranco. Operating on the fringes of avant-garde music, Jon Hassell recorded a series of albums including Power Spot (1986), Flash of the Spirit (1988) City: Works of Fiction (1990), Dressing for Pleasure (1994), Fascinoma (1998) and Hollow Bamboo (2000). Due to health issues, he reduced his live and recording workload. Signing to the ECM label , he released Last Night the Moon Came Dropping Its Clothes in the Street (2009). His final two studio releases - Listening to Pictures (Pentimento Volume One) (2018) and Seeing Through Sound (Pentimento Volume Two) (2020) – were released on his own Ndeya label. Jon Hassell died on June 26, 2021, at the age of 84.

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