name	Naked Lunch
author	William S. Burroughs
country	France
language	English
genre	Novel
publisher	Olympia Press/Grove Press (US)
pub date	1959
media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
isbn	ISBN 9783548028439 (reprint)
oclc	69257438 }}

''Naked Lunch'' (sometimes ''The Naked Lunch'') is a novel by William S. Burroughs originally published in 1959. The book is structured as a series of loosely-connected vignettes. Burroughs stated that the chapters are intended to be read in any order. The reader follows the narration of junkie William Lee, who takes on various aliases, from the US to Mexico, eventually to Tangier and the dreamlike Interzone. The vignettes (which Burroughs called "routines") are drawn from Burroughs' own experience in these places, and his addiction to drugs (heroin, morphine, and while in Tangier, "Majoun" — a strong marijuana confection — as well as a German opioid, brand name Eukodol, of which he wrote frequently).

The novel was included in ''Time'' magazine's "100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005". David Cronenberg released a film of the same title based upon the novel and other Burroughs writings in 1991.

Title origin

The book was originally published with the title ''The Naked Lunch'' in Paris in July 1959 by Olympia Press. Because of US obscenity laws, a complete American edition (by Grove Press) did not follow until 1962. It was titled ''Naked Lunch'' and was substantially different from the Olympia Press edition, because it was based on an earlier 1958 manuscript in Allen Ginsberg's possession. The article "the" in the title was never intended by the author, but added by the editors of the Olympia Press 1959 edition. Nonetheless ''The Naked Lunch'' remained the title used for the 1968 and 1974 Corgi Books editions, and the novel is often known by the alternative name, especially in the UK where these editions circulated.

Burroughs states in his introduction that Jack Kerouac suggested the title. "The title means exactly what the words say: ''naked'' lunch, a frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork." In a June 1960 letter to Allen Ginsberg, Kerouac said he was pleased that Burroughs had credited him with the title. He states that Ginsberg misread "Naked Lust" from the manuscript, and only he noticed; that section of the manuscript later became ''Queer'', although the phrase does not appear in either of the two final texts of that novel.

Plot summary

''Naked Lunch'' is a non-linear narrative that is difficult to describe in terms of plot. The following is a summary of some of the events in the book that could be considered the most relevant.

The book begins with the adventures of William Lee (aka Lee the Agent), who is Burroughs' alter ego in the novel. His journey starts in the US where he is fleeing the police, in search of his next fix. There are short chapters here describing the different characters he travels with and meets along the way.

Eventually he gets to Mexico where he is assigned to Dr. Benway; for what, he is not told. Benway appears and he tells about his previous doings in Annexia as a "Total Demoralizator". The story then moves to a state called Freeland — a form of limbo — where we learn of Islam Inc. Here, some new characters are introduced, such as Clem, Carl, and Joselito.

A short section then jumps in space and time to a marketplace. The Black Meat is sold here and compared to "junk", i.e. heroin. The action then moves back to the hospital where Benway is fully revealed as a cruel, manipulative sadist.

Time and space again shifts the narrative to a location known as Interzone. Hassan, one of the notable characters of the book and "a notorious liquefactionist," is throwing a violent orgy. AJ crashes the party and wreaks havoc, decapitating people and imitating a pirate. Hassan is enraged and tells AJ never to return, calling him a "factualist bitch" - a term which is enlarged much later when the apparently "clashing" political factions within Interzone are described. These include the Liquefactionists, the Senders, the Factualists, the Divisionists, who occupy "a midway position". A short descriptive section tells us of Interzone University, where a professor and his students are ridiculed; the book moves on to an orgy that AJ himself throws.

The book then shifts back to the market place and a description of the totalitarian government of Annexia. Characters including the County Clerk, Benway, Dr Berger, Clem and Jody are sketched through heavy dialogue and their own sub-stories.

After the description of the four parties of Interzone, we are then told more stories about AJ. After briefly describing Interzone, the novel breaks down into sub-stories and heavily cut-up influenced passages.

In a sudden return to what seems to be Lee's reality, two police officers, Hauser and O'Brien, catch up with Lee, who kills both of them. Lee then goes out to a street phone booth and calls the Narcotics Squad, saying he wants to speak to O'Brien. A Lieutenant Gonzales on the other end of the line claims there's no one in their records called O'Brien. When Lee asks for Hauser instead, the reply is identical; Lee hangs up, and goes on the run once again. The book then becomes increasingly disjointed and impressionistic, and finally simply stops.

Literary significance and reception

''Naked Lunch'' is considered Burroughs' seminal work, and one of the landmark publications in the history of American literature. Extremely controversial in both its subject matter and its use of obscene language (something Burroughs recognized and intended), the book was banned in Boston and Los Angeles in the United States, and several European publishers were harassed. It was one of the most recent American books over which an obscenity trial was held. The book was banned in Boston in 1962 due to obscenity (notably child murder and acts of pedophilia), but that decision was reversed in 1966 by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. The Appeals Court found the book did not violate obscenity statutes, as it was found to have some social value. The hearing included testimony in support of the work by Allen Ginsberg and Norman Mailer.

Sections of the manuscript were published in the spring, 1958 number of Robert Creeley's Black Mountain Review and in the spring 1958 University of Chicago student-run publication ''The Chicago Review''. The student edition was not well received, and caused the university administration to discuss the future censorship of the Winter 1959 edition of the publication, resulting in the resignation of all but one of the editors. When the editor Paul Carroll published ''BIG TABLE'' Magazine (Issue No. 1, Spring 1959) alongside former ''Chicago Review'' editor Irving Rosenthal, he was found guilty of sending obscene material through the U.S. mail for including "Ten Episodes from ''Naked Lunch''," a piece of writing the Judicial Officer for the United States Postal Service deemed "undisciplined prose, far more akin to the early work of experimental adolescents than to anything of literary merit" and initially judged it as non-mailable under the provisions of .

Upon publication, Grove Press added to the book supplementary material regarding the censorship battle as well as an article written by Burroughs on the topic of drug addiction. In 2002, a "restored text" edition of ''Naked Lunch'' was published with some new and previously suppressed material added.

On a more specific level, ''Naked Lunch'' also protests the death penalty. In Burroughs' "Deposition: A Testimony Concerning A Sickness," "The Blue Movies" (appearing in the vignette "A.J.'s Annual Party"), is deemed "a tract against capital punishment."

Allusions in other works

There have been many references to ''Naked Lunch'' in popular culture, the most notable of which are listed below.

The British science fiction magazine ''Interzone'' takes its name from the novel.

The band Steely Dan takes its name from a dildo featured in the book.

Alt-country band Clem Snide is named for a character in ''Naked Lunch'', who reappears in other works by Burroughs.

The band Showbread titled one of their songs "Naked Lunch" in their 2006 release ''Age of Reptiles''.

In the 1984 Alex Cox film, ''Repo Man'', there is a hospital scene in which Dr. Benway and Mr. Lee are paged. The two are also paged in a hospital scene in the 1998 film ''Dark City''.

The instrumental post-rock band Tortoise included a song entitled "Benway" on their 2001 album ''Standards''.

The post-punk band Joy Division's debut album ''Unknown Pleasures'' featured a song called "Interzone."

In 2006, the British electronic band Klaxons released a track called "Atlantis to Interzone."

Sonic Youth included a full version of "Dr. Benway's House" on the 2005 deluxe edition of their 1990 album ''Goo''. An excerpt of the track appears on Burroughs' album ''Dead City Radio''.

On The Firesign Theatre album ''Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him'', the track "Le Trente-Huit Cunegonde" features a story in which the 1960s counterculture has become mainstream, and a bomber drops a load of hardcover copies of ''Naked Lunch'' on the last "un-hip" stronghold in the world in Nigeria. The track features a character named Dr. Benway; characters with that name also appear in the group's later albums ''I Think We're All Bozos on This Bus'' and ''The Tale of the Giant Rat of Sumatra''.

In the ''Mystery Science Theater 3000'' episode "Master Ninja I", Joel and his robot sidekicks show their newest invention: pop-up books based on classic literature. Crow tries to show his contribution, a pop-up version of ''Naked Lunch'', but no one wants to open it.

The lyrics to Bomb the Bass' track "Bug Powder Dust" make numerous references to the novel.

The band The Tea Party's sixth album, ''The Interzone Mantras'', refers the novel.

The B-side to Ed Rush & Optical's 1997 single ''Funktion'' is titled "Naked Lunch".

The second album of post-rock band Bark Psychosis, called Codename: Dustsucker, features a song called "The Black Meat".

Bart, Nelson, Martin, and Milhouse watch the film in the Simpsons episode Bart on the Road. Upon leaving the theater, Nelson exclaims, "I can think of two things wrong with that title."

In an episode of the Sci-Fi show Farscape (Fractures S3E18) pieces of an alien called a Boolite are collected and laid on a table. Part of it moves and it starts making gurgling noises at them. John Crichton: "Can he hear us?" Boolite: "Yes." Jool: "Well...there's an ear here somewhere." John Crichton: "Alright, this is a little too Naked Lunch."

Film adaptation

Ever since the 1960s, numerous film makers considered how to adapt ''Naked Lunch'' for the screen. Antony Balch, who worked with Burroughs on a number of short film projects in 1960s, considered making the film as a musical with Mick Jagger in the leading role, but the project fell through when relationships soured between Balch and Jagger. Others, too, wanted to bring the novel to celluloid, but it was ultimately deemed unfilmable.

It was not until 1991 that Canadian director David Cronenberg took up the challenge. Rather than attempt an adaptation of the novel, due to the novel's structure not lending itself to the medium of film, Cronenberg took very few elements from the book and combined them with elements from Burroughs' own life, to create a fiction-biography hybrid and a film about the writing of the book and not about the book itself. The film, however, was presented and marketed as "Naked Lunch." Peter Weller starred as William Lee in this film, Lee being the pseudonym Burroughs used when he wrote ''Junkie''. The voice of the mugwumps, typewriters and Exterminator #2 was provided by actor Peter Boretski.

Footnotes

External links

The Boston Trial of Naked Lunch.

Naked Lunch @50

Naked Lunch: the First Fifty Years An online exhibition at Columbia University, Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Category:1959 novels Category:Novels by William S. Burroughs Category:American novels Category:French novels Category:Novels set in Morocco Category:Beat novels Category:Obscenity controversies Category:Postmodern novels Category:Metafictional works Category:Drug culture

da:Nøgen Frokost de:Naked Lunch es:El almuerzo desnudo (novela) fr:Le Festin nu gl:Naked Lunch it:Pasto nudo pl:Nagi lunch pt:Naked Lunch ru:Голый завтрак simple:Naked Lunch

birth name	David Paul Cronenberg
birth date	March 15, 1943
birth place	Toronto, Ontario, Canada
occupation	Director, producer, screenwriter
years active	1966–present
spouse	Margaret Hindson (1970–1977)Carolyn Zeifman (1979–)
alma mater	University of Toronto }}

David Paul Cronenberg, OC, FRSC (born March 15, 1943) is a Canadian filmmaker, screenwriter and actor. He is one of the principal originators of what is commonly known as the ''body horror'' or ''venereal horror'' genre. This style of filmmaking explores people's fears of bodily transformation and infection. In his films, the psychological is typically intertwined with the physical. In the first half of his career, he explored these themes mostly through horror and science fiction, although his work has since expanded beyond these genres. He has been called "the most audacious and challenging narrative director in the English-speaking world."

Personal life

Cronenberg was born in Toronto, Ontario, where he currently lives. He is the son of Esther (née Sumberg), a musician, and Milton Cronenberg, a writer and editor. He was raised in a middle-class progressive Jewish family. Cronenberg attended Harbord Collegiate Institute, later graduating from University College, University of Toronto with a degree in literature, having switched from science. He has cited William S. Burroughs and Vladimir Nabokov as influences. He is an atheist and does not believe in an afterlife.

In the 1992 book ''Cronenberg on Cronenberg'', he revealed that ''The Brood'' was inspired by events that occurred during the unraveling of his first marriage, which caused both Cronenberg and his daughter Cassandra a great deal of turmoil. The character Nola Carveth, mother of the brood, is based on Cassandra's mother. Cronenberg said that he found the shooting of the climactic scene, in which Nola was strangled by her husband, to be "very satisfying".

Career

After two short sketch films and two short art-house features (the black and white ''Stereo'' and the colour ''Crimes of the Future'') Cronenberg went into partnership with Ivan Reitman. The Canadian government provided financing for his films through the 1970s. He alternated his signature "body horror" films such as ''Shivers'' with projects reflecting his interest in car racing and bike gangs. ''Rabid'' exploited the unexpected acting talents of pornographic actress Marilyn Chambers (Cronenberg's first choice was a young, then-unknown Sissy Spacek). ''Rabid'' was a breakthrough with international distributors and his next two horror features gained stronger support.

Over the arc of his career, Cronenberg's films follow a definite progression, a movement from the social world to the inner life. In his early films, scientists modify human bodies, which results in the breakdown of social order (e.g. ''Shivers'', ''Rabid''). In his middle period, the chaos wrought by the scientist is more personal, (e.g. ''The Brood'', ''Scanners'', ''Videodrome''). In the later period, the scientist himself is altered by his experiment (e.g. his remake of ''The Fly''). This trajectory culminates in ''Dead Ringers'' in which a twin pair of gynecologists spiral into codependency and drug addiction. His later films tend more to the psychological, often contrasting subjective and objective realities (''eXistenZ'', ''M. Butterfly'', ''Spider'').

Perhaps the best example of a film that straddles the line between his works of personal chaos and psychological confusion is Cronenberg's "adaptation" of his literary hero William S. Burroughs' most controversial book, ''Naked Lunch''. The book was considered "unfilmable" and Cronenberg acknowledged that a straight translation into film would "cost 100 million dollars and be banned in every country in the world". Instead—much like in his earlier film, ''Videodrome''—he consistently blurred the lines between what appeared to be reality and what appeared to be hallucinations brought on by the main character's drug addiction. Some of the book's "moments" (as well as incidents loosely based upon Burroughs' life) are presented in this manner within the film. Cronenberg stated that while writing the screenplay for ''Naked Lunch'', he felt a moment of synergy with the writing style of Burroughs. He felt the connection between his screenwriting style and Burroughs' prose style was so strong, that he jokingly remarked that should Burroughs pass on, "I'll just write his next book."

Cronenberg has said that his films should be seen "from the point of view of the disease", and that, for example, he identifies with the characters in ''Shivers'' ''after'' they become infected with the anarchic parasites. Disease and disaster, in Cronenberg's work, are less problems to be overcome than agents of personal transformation. Of his characters' transformations, Cronenberg said, "But because of our necessity to impose our own structure of perception on things we look on ourselves as being relatively stable. But, in fact, when I look at a person I see this maelstrom of organic, chemical and electron chaos; volatility and instability, shimmering; and the ability to change and transform and transmute." Similarly, in ''Crash'' (1996), people who have been injured in car crashes attempt to view their ordeal as "a fertilizing rather than a destructive event". In 2005, Cronenberg would say that he was upset that Paul Haggis had chosen the same name for his Academy Award winning film ''Crash'', feeling it was "stupid" and "very disrespectful."

Aside from ''The Dead Zone'' (1983) and ''The Fly'', Cronenberg has not generally worked within the world of big-budget, mainstream Hollywood filmmaking, although he has had occasional near misses. At one stage he was considered by George Lucas as a possible director for ''Return of the Jedi'' but was passed. Cronenberg also worked for nearly a year on a version of ''Total Recall'' but experienced "creative differences" with producers Dino De Laurentiis and Ronald Shusett. A different version of the film was eventually made by Paul Verhoeven. A fan of Philip K. Dick, author of "We Can Remember it For You Wholesale," the short story upon which the film was based, Cronenberg related (in the biography/overview of his work, ''Cronenberg on Cronenberg'') that his dissatisfaction with what he envisioned the film to be and what it ended up being pained him so greatly that for a time, he suffered a migraine just thinking about it, akin to a needle piercing his eye.

In the late 1990s, Cronenberg was announced as director of a sequel to another Verhoeven film, ''Basic Instinct'', but this also fell through. His recent work, the thriller ''A History of Violence'' (2005), is one of his highest budgeted and most accessible to date. He has said that the decision to direct it was influenced by his having had to defer some of his salary on the low-budgeted ''Spider'', but it is one of his most critically acclaimed films to date, along with ''Eastern Promises'' (2007) a film about the struggle of one man to gain power in the Russian Mafia.

Cronenberg has collaborated with composer Howard Shore on all of his films since ''The Brood'' (1979), (see List of noted film director and composer collaborations) with the exception of ''The Dead Zone'' (1983), which was scored by Michael Kamen. Other regular collaborators include actor Robert Silverman, art director Carol Spier, sound editor Bryan Day, film editor Ronald Sanders, his sister, costume designer Denise Cronenberg, and, from 1979 until 1988, cinematographer Mark Irwin. In 2008, Cronenberg directed Howard Shore's first opera, ''The Fly''.

Since 1988's ''Dead Ringers'', Cronenberg has worked with cinematographer Peter Suschitzky on each of his films (see List of noted film director and cinematographer collaborations). Suschitzky was the director of photography for ''The Empire Strikes Back'', and Cronenberg remarked that Suschitzky's work in that film "was the only one of those movies that actually looked good", which was a motivating factor to work with him on ''Dead Ringers''.

Having worked with many Hollywood stars, Cronenberg says that he did not get to make a film with an actor he wanted to work with for a long time, Burt Reynolds. Cronenberg remains a staunchly Canadian filmmaker, with nearly all of his films (including major studio vehicles ''The Dead Zone'' and ''The Fly'') having been filmed in his home province Ontario. Notable exceptions include ''M. Butterfly'' and ''Spider'', most of which were shot in China and England, respectively. ''Rabid'' and ''Shivers'' were shot in and around Montreal. Most of his films have been at least partially financed by Telefilm Canada, and Cronenberg is a vocal supporter of government-backed film projects, saying "Every country needs [a system of government grants] in order to have a national cinema in the face of Hollywood".

Cronenberg has also appeared as an actor in other directors' films. Most of his roles are cameo appearances, as in ''Into The Night'', ''Jason X'', ''To Die For'', and ''Alias'', but on occasion he has played major roles, as in ''Nightbreed'' or ''Last Night''. He has not played major roles in any of his own films, but he did put in a brief appearance as a gynecologist in ''The Fly''; he can also be glimpsed among the sex-crazed hordes in ''Shivers''; he can be heard as an unseen car-pound attendant in ''Crash''; his hands can be glimpsed in ''eXistenZ''; and he appeared as a stand-in for James Woods in ''Videodrome'' for shots in which Woods' character wore a helmet that covered his head.

In 2008 Cronenberg realized two extra-cinematographic projects: the exhibition Chromosomes at the Rome Film Fest and the opera ''The Fly'' at the LaOpera in Los Angeles and Theatre Châtelet in Paris.

Future projects

In July 2010, Cronenberg completed production on ''A Dangerous Method'', an adaptation of Christopher Hampton's play ''The Talking Cure'', starring Keira Knightley, Michael Fassbender, and frequent collaborator Viggo Mortensen. The film was produced by independent British producer Jeremy Thomas.

He also plans to write and direct an adaptation of Don Delillo's ''Cosmopolis''.

Awards and recognition

He received the Special Jury Prize at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival for ''Crash''.

In 1999, Cronenberg was inducted onto Canada's Walk of Fame. In 2002, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada, and in 2006 he was awarded the Cannes Film Festival's lifetime achievement award, the Carrosse d'Or.

Cronenberg has appeared on various "Greatest Director" lists. In 2004, Science Fiction magazine Strange Horizons named him the 2nd greatest director in the history of the genre, ahead of better known directors such as Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Jean-Luc Godard and Ridley Scott. In the same year, ''The Guardian'' listed him 9th on their list of "The world's 40 best directors". In addition, in 2007, Total Film named him as the 17th greatest director of all-time.

In 2006, he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the senior national body of distinguished Canadian scientists and scholars.

In 2009 Cronenberg received the Légion d'honneur from the government of France. The following year Cronenberg was named an honorary patron of the University Philosophical Society, Trinity College, Dublin.

Filmography

As director

;Feature films

''Stereo'' (1969)

''Crimes of the Future'' (1970)

''Shivers'' (1975)

''Rabid'' (1977)

''Fast Company'' (1979)

''The Brood'' (1979)

''Scanners'' (1981)

''Videodrome'' (1983)

''The Dead Zone'' (1983)

''The Fly'' (1986)

''Dead Ringers'' (1988)

''Naked Lunch'' (1991)

''M. Butterfly'' (1993)

''Crash'' (1996)

''eXistenZ'' (1999)

''Spider'' (2002)

''A History of Violence'' (2005)

''Eastern Promises'' (2007)

''A Dangerous Method'' (2011)

''Cosmopolis'' (2012)

;Short films

''Transfer'' (1966)

''From the Drain'' (1967)

''Camera'' (2000)

''To Each His Own Cinema'' (''Chacun son cinéma'') (2007)

* segment: ''At the Suicide of the Last Jew in the World in the Last Cinema in the World''

;Television series

''Programme X''

* episode: * ''Secret Weapons'' (1972)

''Peep Show''

* episodes: ''The Victim'' (1975) & ''The Lie Chair'' [1975]

''Teleplay''

* episode: ''The Italian Machine'' (1976) watch it here (RealMedia)

''Friday the 13th: The Series''

* episode: 1.12 ''Faith Healer'' (1987)

''Scales of Justice''

* episodes: ''Regina vs Horvath'' (1990) & ''Regina vs Logan'' (1990)

;Television spots

''Jim Ritchie Sculptor'' (1971)

''Letter from Michelangelo'' (1971)

''Tourettes'' (1971)

''Don Valley'' (1972)

''Fort York'' (1972)

''Lakeshore'' (1972)

''Winter Garden'' (1972)

''Scarborough Bluffs'' (1972)

''In the Dirt'' (1972)

;Commercials

''Hydro''

* Client: Ontario Hydro

* Product: Energy conservation

* Agency: Burghardt Wolowich Crunkhorn

* Production company: The Partners' Film Company Ltd.

* Format: 4 x 30-second commercials

* Titles: ''Hot Showers'', ''Laundry'', ''Cleaners'', ''Timers''

''Caramilk''

* Client: William Neilson Ltd.

* Product: Cadbury Caramilk

* Agency: Scali McCabe, Sloves (Canada) Ltd.

* Production company: The Partners' Film Company Ltd.

* Format: 2 x 30-second commercials

* Titles: ''Bistro'', ''Surveillance''

''Nike''

* Client: Nike International

* Product: Nike Air 180

* Agency: Wieden and Kennedy

* Production company: The Partners' Film Company Ltd.

* Format: 1 x 15-second/4 x 30-second commercials

* Title: ''Transformation''

As producer

''Dead Ringers'' (1988)

''Crash'' (1996)

''I'm Losing You'' (1998)

''Drone'' (2008)

''Cosmopolis'' (2012)

As actor

''Into the Night'' (1985)

''The Fly'' (1986, cameo)

''Nightbreed'' (1990)

''To Die For'' (1995, cameo)

''Blood and Donuts'' (1995)

''The Stupids'' (1996, cameo)

''Extreme Measures'' (1996, cameo)

''Last Night'' (1998)

''Resurrection'' (1999)

''Jason X'' (2002)

''Alias'' (TV) (2003) (Episodes "Remnants" and "Conscious")

''Barney's Version'' (2010, cameo)

Notes

Further reading

Mark Browning (2007): ''David Cronenberg: Author or Filmmaker?'' (ISBN 978-1-84150-173-4)

Thomas J. Dreibrodt (2000): '' Lang lebe das neue Fleisch. Die Filme von David Cronenberg — von 'Shivers' bis 'eXistenZ'.'' (academic; in German) (ISBN 978-3-932872-05-1)

Serge Grünberg, ed. (2006): ''David Cronenberg'' (interviews) (ISBN 978-0-85965-376-3)

Piers Handling (1983): ''The Shape of Rage: The Films of David Cronenberg'' (ISBN 978-0-7736-1137-5)

Kim Newman (1989): ''Nightmare Movies: A Critical History of the Horror Film 1968–1988'' (ISBN 978-0-517-57366-2)

Drehli Robnik, Michael Palm, eds. (1992): Und das Wort ist Fleisch geworden. Texte über Filme von David Cronenberg. Vienna, PVS: 1992. ISBN 978-3-901196-02-7

External links

David Cronenberg at Rotten Tomatoes

David Cronenberg Bibliography (via UC Berkeley)

An interview at Salon.com (November 1999)

BBC interview with Cronenberg (Video, October 2007)

David Cronenberg Profile by ''The New York Times Magazine'' (September 2005)

Category:1943 births Category:Canadian atheists Category:Canadian film actors Category:Canadian film directors Category:Surrealist filmmakers Category:Canadian Jews Category:Jewish atheists Category:Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada Category:Genie Award winners for Best Achievement in Direction Category:Légion d'honneur recipients Category:Jewish actors Category:Officers of the Order of Canada Category:People from Toronto Category:University of Toronto alumni Category:Living people Category:Genie Award winners for Best Screenplay

ar:ديفد كروننبرغ an:David Cronenberg bn:ডেভিড ক্রোনেনবার্গ bg:Дейвид Кронънбърг ca:David Cronenberg cs:David Cronenberg da:David Cronenberg de:David Cronenberg es:David Cronenberg fr:David Cronenberg gl:David Cronenberg it:David Cronenberg he:דייוויד קרוננברג lv:Deivids Kronenbergs hu:David Cronenberg nl:David Cronenberg ja:デヴィッド・クローネンバーグ no:David Cronenberg pl:David Cronenberg pt:David Cronenberg ro:David Cronenberg ru:Кроненберг, Дэвид fi:David Cronenberg sv:David Cronenberg th:เดวิด โครเนนเบิร์ก tg:Давид Кроненберг tr:David Cronenberg uk:Девід Кроненберг zh:大衛·柯能堡

name	Frank Zappa
background	solo_singer
birth name	Frank Vincent Zappa
born	December 21, 1940Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.
died	December 04, 1993Los Angeles, California, U.S.
instrument	Guitar, vocals, bass, keyboards, drums, synclavier, bicycle
genre	Progressive rock, jazz fusion,
occupation	Composer, musician, conductor, producer
years active	1950s–1993
label	Verve, Bizarre, Straight, DiscReet, Barking Pumpkin
associated acts	The Mothers of InventionCaptain BeefheartSteve Vai
website
notable instruments	}}

Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American composer, singer-songwriter, electric guitarist, record producer and film director. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa wrote rock, jazz, orchestral and musique concrète works. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed album covers. Zappa produced almost all of the more than 60 albums he released with the band The Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist.

While in his teens, he acquired a taste for percussion-based avant-garde composers such as Edgard Varèse and 1950s rhythm and blues music. He began writing classical music in high school, while at the same time playing drums in rhythm and blues bands; he later switched to electric guitar. He was a self-taught composer and performer, and his diverse musical influences led him to create music that was often impossible to categorize. His 1966 debut album with The Mothers of Invention, ''Freak Out!'', combined songs in conventional rock and roll format with collective improvisations and studio-generated sound collages. His later albums shared this eclectic and experimental approach, irrespective of whether the fundamental format was one of rock, jazz or classical. He wrote the lyrics to all his songs, which—often humorously—reflected his iconoclastic view of established social and political processes, structures and movements. He was a strident critic of mainstream education and organized religion, and a forthright and passionate advocate for freedom of speech, self-education, political participation and the abolition of censorship.

Zappa was a highly productive and prolific artist and gained widespread critical acclaim. Many of his albums are considered essential in rock and jazz history. He is regarded as one of the most original guitarists and composers of his time. He also remains a major influence on musicians and composers. He had some commercial success, particularly in Europe, and for most of his career was able to work as an independent artist. Zappa was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997.

Zappa was married to Kathryn J. "Kay" Sherman from 1960 to 1964. In 1967, he married Adelaide Gail Sloatman, with whom he remained until his death from prostate cancer in 1993. They had four children: Moon Unit, Dweezil, Ahmet Emuukha Rodan and Diva Thin Muffin Pigeen. Gail Zappa manages the businesses of her late husband under the name the ''Zappa Family Trust''.

Early life

Frank Zappa was born in Baltimore, Maryland, on December 21, 1940. His mother, Rose Marie Colimore, was of Italian and French descent; his father, Francesco Vincente Zappa, was a native of Partinico, Sicily. Zappa was the eldest of four children. The family moved often because his father, a chemist and mathematician, worked in the defense industry. After a time in Florida in the 1940s, the family returned to Maryland, where Zappa's father worked at the Edgewood Arsenal chemical warfare facility of the Aberdeen Proving Ground. Due to their home's nearness to the arsenal, which stored mustard gas, gas masks were kept in the home. This had a profound effect on Zappa, and references to germs, germ warfare and the defense industry occur throughout his work.

Zappa was often sick as a child, suffering from asthma, earaches and sinus problems. A doctor treated his sinusitis by inserting a pellet of radium into each of Zappa's nostrils; little was known about the potential dangers of even small amounts of therapeutic radiation. Nasal imagery and references appear in his music and lyrics, as well as in the collage album covers created by his long-time collaborator Cal Schenkel.

Many of Zappa's childhood diseases may have been due to exposure to mustard gas. His health worsened when he lived in Baltimore. In 1952, his family relocated for reasons of health. They moved next to Monterey, California, where his father taught metallurgy at the Naval Postgraduate School. They soon moved to Claremont, then to El Cajon, before finally settling San Diego.

Musical influences

Zappa joined his first band, the Ramblers, at Mission Bay High School in San Diego. He was the band's drummer. About the same time his parents bought a phonograph, which allowed him to develop his interest in music, and to begin building his record collection. R&B; singles were early purchases, starting a large collection he kept for the rest of his life. He was interested in sounds for their own sake, particularly the sounds of drums and other percussion instruments. By age 12, he had obtained a snare drum and began learning the basics of orchestral percussion. Zappa's deep interest in modern classical music began when he read a ''LOOK'' magazine article about the Sam Goody record store chain that lauded its ability to sell an LP as obscure as ''The Complete Works of Edgard Varèse, Volume One''. The article described Varèse's percussion composition ''Ionisation'', produced by EMS Recordings, as "a weird jumble of drums and other unpleasant sounds". Zappa decided to seek out Varèse's music. After searching for over a year, Zappa found a copy (he noticed the LP because of the "mad scientist" looking photo of Varèse on the cover). Not having enough money with him, he persuaded the salesman to sell him the record at a discount. Thus began his lifelong passion for Varèse's music and that of other modern classical composers.

Zappa grew up influenced by avant-garde composers such as Varèse, Igor Stravinsky and Anton Webern, R&B; and doo-wop groups (including the Medallions and local pachuco groups), and modern jazz. His own heterogeneous ethnic background, and the diverse social and cultural mix in and around greater Los Angeles, were crucial in the formation of Zappa as a practitioner of underground music and of his later distrustful and openly critical attitude towards "mainstream" social, political and musical movements. He frequently lampooned musical fads like psychedelia, rock opera and disco. Television also exerted a strong influence, as demonstrated by quotations from show themes and advertising jingles found in his later works.

Youth and beginning of career (1955–1960)

By 1956, the Zappa family had moved to Lancaster, a small aerospace and farming town in the Antelope Valley of the Mojave Desert close to Edwards Air Force Base, in northern Los Angeles County. Zappa's mother encouraged him in his musical interests. Although she disliked Varèse's music, she was indulgent enough to give her son a long distance call to the composer as a 15th birthday present. Unfortunately, Varèse was in Europe at the time, so Zappa spoke to the composer's wife. He later received a letter from Varèse thanking him for his interest, and telling him about a composition he was working on called "Déserts". Living in the desert town of Lancaster, Zappa found this very exciting. Varèse invited him to visit if he ever came to New York. The meeting never took place (Varèse died in 1965), but Zappa framed the letter and kept it on display for the rest of his life.

At Antelope Valley High School, Zappa met Don Vliet (who later expanded his name to Don Van Vliet and adopted the stage name Captain Beefheart). Zappa and Vliet became close friends, sharing an interest in R&B; records and influencing each other musically throughout their careers. Around the same time, Zappa started playing drums in a local band, The Blackouts. The band was racially diverse, and included Euclid James "Motorhead" Sherwood who later became a member of The Mothers of Invention. Zappa's interest in the guitar grew, and in 1957 he was given his first guitar. Among his early influences were Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Howlin' Wolf and Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown. (In the 1970s and '80s, he invited Watson to perform on several albums.) Zappa considered soloing as the equivalent of forming "air sculptures", and developed an eclectic, innovative and highly personal style.

Zappa's interest in composing and arranging proliferated in his last high-school years. By his final year, he was writing, arranging and conducting avant-garde performance pieces for the school orchestra. He graduated from Antelope Valley High School in 1958, and later acknowledged two of his music teachers on the sleeve of the 1966 album ''Freak Out!'' Due to his family's frequent moves, Zappa attended at least six different high schools, and as a student he was often bored and given to distracting the rest of the class with juvenile antics. He left community college after one semester, and maintained thereafter a disdain for formal education, taking his children out of school at age 15 and refusing to pay for their college.

Zappa left home in 1959, and moved into a small apartment in Echo Park, Los Angeles. After meeting Kathryn J. "Kay" Sherman during his short stay at Pomona College, they moved in together in Ontario, and were married December 28, 1960. Zappa worked for a short period in advertising. His sojourn in the commercial world was brief, but gave him valuable insights into how it works. Throughout his career, he took a keen interest in the visual presentation of his work, designing some of his album covers and directing his own films and videos.

Early 1960s: Studio Z

Zappa attempted to earn a living as a musician and composer, and played different nightclub gigs, some with a new version of The Blackouts. Financially more rewarding were Zappa's earliest professional recordings, two soundtracks for the low-budget films ''The World's Greatest Sinner'' (1962) and ''Run Home Slow'' (1965). The former score was commissioned by actor-producer Timothy Carey and recorded in 1961. It contains many themes that appeared on later Zappa records. The latter soundtrack was recorded in 1963 after the film was completed, but it was commissioned by one of Zappa's former high school teachers in 1959 and Zappa may have worked on it before the film was shot. Excerpts from the soundtrack can be heard on the posthumous album ''The Lost Episodes'' (1996).

During the early 1960s, Zappa wrote and produced songs for other local artists, often working with singer-songwriter Ray Collins and producer Paul Buff. Their "Memories of El Monte" was recorded by The Penguins, although only Cleve Duncan of the original group was featured. Buff owned the small Pal Recording Studio in Cucamonga, which included a unique five-track tape recorder he had built. At that time, only a handful of the most sophisticated commercial studios had multi-track facilities; the industry standard for smaller studios was still mono or two-track. Although none of the recordings from the period achieved major commercial success, Zappa earned enough money to allow him to stage a concert of his orchestral music in 1963 and to broadcast and record it. He appeared on Steve Allen's syndicated late night show the same year, in which he played a bicycle as a musical instrument. With Captain Beefheart, Zappa recorded some songs under the name of The Soots. They were rejected by Dot Records for having "no commercial potential", a verdict Zappa subsequently quoted on the sleeve of ''Freak Out!''

In 1964, after his marriage started to break up, he moved into the Pal studio and began routinely working 12 hours or more per day recording and experimenting with overdubbing and audio tape manipulation. This set a work pattern that endured for most of his life. Aided by his income from film composing, Zappa took over the studio from Paul Buff, who was now working with Art Laboe at Original Sound. It was renamed Studio Z. Studio Z was rarely booked for recordings by other musicians. Instead, friends moved in, notably James "Motorhead" Sherwood. Zappa started performing as guitarist with a power trio, The Muthers, in local bars in order to support himself.

An article in the local press describing Zappa as "the Movie King of Cucamonga" prompted the local police to suspect that he was making pornographic films. In March 1965, Zappa was approached by a vice squad undercover officer, and accepted an offer of $100 to produce a suggestive audio tape for an alleged stag party. Zappa and a female friend recorded a faked erotic episode. When Zappa was about to hand over the tape, he was arrested, and the police stripped the studio of all recorded material. The press was tipped off beforehand, and next day's ''The Daily Report'' wrote that "Vice Squad investigators stilled the tape recorders of a free-swinging, a-go-go film and recording studio here Friday and arrested a self-styled movie producer". Zappa was charged with "conspiracy to commit pornography". This felony charge was reduced and he was sentenced to six months in jail on a misdemeanor, with all but ten days suspended. His brief imprisonment left a permanent mark, and was key in the formation of his anti-authoritarian stance. Zappa lost several recordings made at Studio Z in the process, as the police only returned 30 out of 80 hours of tape seized. Eventually, he could no longer afford to pay the rent on the studio and was evicted. Zappa managed to recover some of his possessions before the studio was torn down in 1966.

Late 1960s: The Mothers of Invention

In 1965, Zappa was approached by Ray Collins who asked him to take over as the guitarist in local R&B; band The Soul Giants, following a fight between Collins and the group's original guitarist. Zappa accepted, and soon he assumed leadership and the role as co-lead singer (even though he never considered himself a singer). He convinced the other members that they should play his music to increase the chances of getting a record contract. The band was renamed The Mothers, coincidentally on Mother's Day. The group increased their bookings after beginning an association with manager Herb Cohen, while they gradually gained attention on the burgeoning Los Angeles underground music scene. In early 1966, they were spotted by leading record producer Tom Wilson when playing "Trouble Every Day", a song about the Watts Riots. Wilson had earned acclaim as the producer for singer-songwriter Bob Dylan and the folk-rock act Simon & Garfunkel, and was notable as one of the few African Americans working as a major label pop music producer at this time.

Wilson signed The Mothers to the Verve Records division of MGM Records, which had built up a strong reputation in the music industry for its releases of modern jazz recordings in the 1940s and 1950s, but was attempting to diversify into pop and rock audiences. Verve insisted that the band officially re-title themselves "The Mothers of Invention" because "Mother", in slang terminology, was short for "motherfucker" — a term that apart from its profane meanings can denote a skilled musician.

Debut album: ''Freak Out!'' (1966)

With Wilson credited as producer, The Mothers of Invention, augmented by a studio orchestra, recorded the groundbreaking ''Freak Out!'' (1966) which, preceded by Bob Dylan's ''Blonde on Blonde'', was the second rock double album ever released. It mixed R&B;, doo-wop, musique concrète, and experimental sound collages that captured the "freak" subculture of Los Angeles at that time. Although he was dissatisfied with the final product—in a late '60s radio interview (included in the posthumous ''MOFO Project/Object'' compilation) Zappa recounted that the side-long closing track "Return of the Son of Monster Magnet" was intended to be the basic track for a much more complex work which Verve did not allow him to complete – ''Freak Out'' immediately established Zappa as a radical new voice in rock music, providing an antidote to the "relentless consumer culture of America". The sound was raw, but the arrangements were sophisticated. While recording in the studio, some of the additional session musicians were shocked that they were expected to read the notes on sheet music from charts with Zappa conducting them, since it was not standard when recording rock music. The lyrics praised non-conformity, disparaged authorities, and had dadaist elements. Yet, there was a place for seemingly conventional love songs. Most compositions are Zappa's, which set a precedent for the rest of his recording career. He had full control over the arrangements and musical decisions and did most overdubs. Wilson provided the industry clout and connections to get the group the financial resources needed.

During the recording of ''Freak Out!'', Zappa moved into a house in Laurel Canyon with friend Pamela Zarubica, who appeared on the album. The house became a meeting (and living) place for many LA musicians and groupies of the time, despite Zappa's disapproval of their illicit drug use. He labeled people on drugs "assholes in action", and he tried cannabis only a few times, but without any pleasure. He was a regular tobacco smoker for most of his life, and strongly critical of anti-tobacco campaigns. After a short promotional tour following the release of ''Freak Out!'', Zappa met Adelaide Gail Sloatman. He fell in love within "a couple of minutes", and she moved into the house over the summer. They married in 1967, had four children and remained together until Zappa's death.

Wilson nominally produced The Mothers' second album ''Absolutely Free'' (1967), which was recorded in November 1966, and later mixed in New York, although by this time Zappa was in ''de facto'' control of most facets of the production. It featured extended playing by The Mothers of Invention and focused on songs that defined Zappa's compositional style of introducing abrupt, rhythmical changes into songs that were built from diverse elements. Examples are "Plastic People" and "Brown Shoes Don't Make It", which contained lyrics critical of the hypocrisy and conformity of American society, but also of the counterculture of the 1960s. As Zappa put it, "[W]e're satirists, and we are out to satirize everything." At the same time, Zappa had recorded material for a self-produced album based on orchestral works to be released under his own name. Due to contractual problems, the recordings were shelved and only made ready for release late in 1967. Zappa took the opportunity to radically restructure the contents, adding newly recorded, improvised dialogue to finalize what became his first solo album (under the name ''Francis Vincent Zappa''), ''Lumpy Gravy'' (1968). It is an "incredible ambitious musical project", a "monument to John Cage", which intertwines orchestral themes, spoken words and electronic noises through radical audio editing techniques.

New York period (1966–1968)

The Mothers of Invention played in New York in late 1966 and were offered a contract at the Garrick Theater during Easter 1967. This proved successful and Herb Cohen extended the booking, which eventually lasted half a year. As a result, Zappa and his wife, along with The Mothers of Invention, moved to New York. Their shows became a combination of improvised acts showcasing individual talents of the band as well as tight performances of Zappa's music. Everything was directed by Zappa's famous hand signals. Guest performers and audience participation became a regular part of the Garrick Theater shows. One evening, Zappa managed to entice some U.S. Marines from the audience onto the stage, where they proceeded to dismember a big baby doll, having been told by Zappa to pretend that it was a "gook baby".

Situated in New York, and only interrupted by the band's first European tour, The Mothers of Invention recorded the album widely regarded as the peak of the group's late 1960s work, ''We're Only in It for the Money'' (released 1968). It was produced by Zappa, with Wilson credited as executive producer. From then on, Zappa produced all albums released by The Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist. ''We're Only in It for the Money'' featured some of the most creative audio editing and production yet heard in pop music, and the songs ruthlessly satirized the hippie and flower power phenomena. The cover photo parodied that of The Beatles' ''Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band''. The cover art was provided by Cal Schenkel whom Zappa met in New York. This initiated a life-long collaboration in which Schenkel designed covers for numerous Zappa and Mothers albums.

Reflecting Zappa's eclectic approach to music, the next album, ''Cruising with Ruben & the Jets'' (1968), was very different. It represented a collection of doo-wop songs; listeners and critics were not sure whether the album was a satire or a tribute. Zappa has noted that the album was conceived in the way Stravinsky's compositions were in his neo-classical period: "If he could take the forms and clichés of the classical era and pervert them, why not do the same ... to doo-wop in the fifties?" A theme from Stravinsky's ''The Rite of Spring'' is heard during one song.

In New York, Zappa increasingly used tape editing as a compositional tool. A prime example is found on the double album ''Uncle Meat'' (1969), where the track "King Kong" is edited from various studio and live performances. Zappa had begun regularly recording concerts, and because of his insistence on precise tuning and timing, he was able to augment his studio productions with excerpts from live shows, and vice versa. Later, he combined recordings of different compositions into new pieces, irrespective of the tempo or meter of the sources. He dubbed this process "xenochrony" (strange synchronizations) — reflecting the Greek "xeno" (alien or strange) and "chrono" (time). Zappa also evolved a compositional approach which he called "conceptual continuity," meaning that any project or album was part of a larger project. Everything was connected, and musical themes and lyrics reappeared in different form on later albums. Conceptual continuity clues are found throughout Zappa's entire œuvre.

During the late 1960s, Zappa continued to develop the business sides of his career. He and Herb Cohen formed the Bizarre Records and Straight Records labels, distributed by Warner Bros. Records, as ventures to aid the funding of projects and to increase creative control. Zappa produced the double album ''Trout Mask Replica'' for Captain Beefheart, and releases by Alice Cooper, Wild Man Fischer, and The GTOs, as well as Lenny Bruce's last live performance.

Disbanding the original Mothers of Invention (1969)

|title=Peaches en Regalia [Song Review] |last=Couture |first=François |publisher=Allmusic |accessdate=April 11, 2010}} and has been covered by many artists. |title="Peaches En Regalia"|pos=right|}}

Zappa and The Mothers of Invention returned to Los Angeles in the summer of 1968, and the Zappas moved into a house on Laurel Canyon Boulevard, only to move again to one on Woodrow Wilson Drive in the autumn. This was to be Zappa's home for the rest of his life. Despite being a success with fans in Europe, The Mothers of Invention were not faring well financially. Their first records were vocally oriented, but Zappa wrote more instrumental jazz and classical oriented music for the band's concerts, which confused audiences. Zappa felt that audiences failed to appreciate his "electrical chamber music". In 1969 there were nine band members and Zappa was supporting the group himself from his publishing royalties whether they played or not. 1969 was also the year Zappa, fed up with MGM's interference, left MGM Records for Warner Bros. Records' Reprise Records subsidiary where Zappa/Mothers recordings would bear the Bizarre Records imprint. In late 1969, Zappa broke up the band. He often cited the financial strain as the main reason, but also commented on the band members' lack of sufficient effort. Many band members were bitter about Zappa's decision, and some took it as a sign of Zappa's concern for perfection at the expense of human feeling. Others were irritated by 'his autocratic ways', exemplified by Zappa's never staying at the same hotel as the band members. Several members would, however, play for Zappa in years to come. Remaining recordings with the band from this period were collected on ''Weasels Ripped My Flesh'' and ''Burnt Weeny Sandwich'' (both released in 1970).

After he disbanded The Mothers of Invention, Zappa released the acclaimed solo album ''Hot Rats'' (1969). It features, for the first time on record, Zappa playing extended guitar solos and contains one of his most enduring compositions, "Peaches en Regalia", which reappeared several times on future recordings. It was backed by jazz, blues and R&B; session players including violinist Don "Sugarcane" Harris, drummers John Guerin and Paul Humphrey, multi-instrumentalist and previous member of Mothers of Invention Ian Underwood, and multi-instrumentalist Shuggie Otis on bass, along with a guest appearance by Captain Beefheart (providing vocals to the only non-instrumental track, "Willie the Pimp"). It became a popular album in England, and had a major influence on the development of the jazz-rock fusion genre.

1970s: From The Mothers to Zappa

In 1970 Zappa met conductor Zubin Mehta. They arranged a May 1970 concert where Mehta conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic augmented by a rock band. According to Zappa, the music was mostly written in motel rooms while on tour with The Mothers of Invention. Some of it was later featured in the movie ''200 Motels''. Although the concert was a success, Zappa's experience working with a symphony orchestra was not a happy one. His dissatisfaction became a recurring theme throughout his career; he often felt that the quality of performance of his material delivered by orchestras was not commensurate with the money he spent on orchestral concerts and recordings.

Rebirth of The Mothers and filmmaking (1970)

Later in 1970, Zappa formed a new version of The Mothers (from then on, he mostly dropped the "of Invention"). It included British drummer Aynsley Dunbar, jazz keyboardist George Duke, Ian Underwood, Jeff Simmons (bass, rhythm guitar), and three members of The Turtles: bass player Jim Pons, and singers Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan, who, due to persistent legal and contractual problems, adopted the stage name "The Phlorescent Leech and Eddie", or "Flo & Eddie".

This version of The Mothers debuted on Zappa's next solo album ''Chunga's Revenge'' (1970), which was followed by the double-album soundtrack to the movie ''200 Motels'' (1971), featuring The Mothers, The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Ringo Starr, Theodore Bikel, and Keith Moon. Co-directed by Zappa and Tony Palmer, it was filmed in a week at Pinewood Studios outside London. Tensions between Zappa and several cast and crew members arose before and during shooting. The film deals loosely with life on the road as a rock musician. It was the first feature film photographed on videotape and transferred to 35 mm film, a process which allowed for novel visual effects. It was released to mixed reviews. The score relied extensively on orchestral music, and Zappa's dissatisfaction with the classical music world intensified when a concert, scheduled at the Royal Albert Hall after filming, was canceled because a representative of the venue found some of the lyrics obscene. In 1975, he lost a lawsuit against the Royal Albert Hall for breach of contract.

After ''200 Motels'', the band went on tour, which resulted in two live albums, ''Fillmore East - June 1971'' and ''Just Another Band From L.A.''; the latter included the 20-minute track "Billy the Mountain", Zappa's satire on rock opera set in Southern California. This track was representative of the band's theatrical performances in which songs were used to build up sketches based on ''200 Motels'' scenes as well as new situations often portraying the band members' sexual encounters on the road.

Accident, attack and their aftermath (1971–1972)

In December 1971, there were two serious setbacks. While performing at Casino de Montreux in Switzerland, The Mothers' equipment was destroyed when a flare set off by an audience member started a fire that burned down the casino. Immortalized in Deep Purple's song "Smoke on the Water", the event and immediate aftermath can be heard on the bootleg album ''Swiss Cheese/Fire'', released legally as part of Zappa's ''Beat the Boots II'' compilation. After a week's break, The Mothers played at the Rainbow Theatre, London, with rented gear. During the encore, an audience member pushed Zappa off the stage and into the concrete-floored orchestra pit. The band thought Zappa had been killed—he had suffered serious fractures, head trauma and injuries to his back, leg, and neck, as well as a crushed larynx, which ultimately caused his voice to drop a third after healing. This left him wheelchair bound, forcing him off the road for over half a year. Upon his return to the stage in September 1972, he was still wearing a leg brace, had a noticeable limp and could not stand for very long while on stage. Zappa noted that one leg healed "shorter than the other" (a reference later found in the lyrics of songs "Zomby Woof" and "Dancin' Fool"), resulting in chronic back pain. Meanwhile, The Mothers were left in limbo and eventually formed the core of Flo and Eddie's band as they set out on their own.

During 1971–1972 Zappa released two strongly jazz-oriented solo LPs, ''Waka/Jawaka'' and ''The Grand Wazoo'', which were recorded during the forced layoff from concert touring, using floating line-ups of session players and Mothers alumni. Musically, the albums were akin to ''Hot Rats''. Zappa began touring again in late 1972. His first effort was a series of concerts in September 1972 with a 20-piece big band referred to as the Grand Wazoo. This was followed by a scaled-down version known as the Petit Wazoo that toured the U.S. for five weeks from October to December 1972.

Top 10 album (1973–1975)

Zappa then formed and toured with smaller groups that variously included Ian Underwood (reeds, keyboards), Ruth Underwood (vibes, marimba), Sal Marquez (trumpet, vocals), Napoleon Murphy Brock (sax, flute and vocals), Bruce Fowler (trombone), Tom Fowler (bass), Chester Thompson (drums), Ralph Humphrey (drums), George Duke (keyboards, vocals), and Jean-Luc Ponty (violin). By 1973 the Bizarre and Straight labels were discontinued. In their place, Zappa and Cohen created DiscReet Records, also distributed by Warner Bros. Zappa continued a high rate of production through the first half of the 1970s, including the solo album ''Apostrophe (')'' (1974), which reached a career-high No. 10 on the Billboard pop album charts helped by the chart single "Don't Eat The Yellow Snow". Other albums from the period are ''Over-Nite Sensation'' (1973), which contained several future concert favorites, such as "Dinah-Moe Humm" and "Montana", and the albums ''Roxy & Elsewhere'' (1974) and ''One Size Fits All'' (1975) which feature ever-changing versions of a band still called The Mothers, and are notable for the tight renditions of highly difficult jazz fusion songs in such pieces as "Inca Roads", "Echidna's Arf (Of You)" and "Be-Bop Tango (Of the Old Jazzmen's Church)". A live recording from 1974, ''You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 2'' (1988), captures "the full spirit and excellence of the 1973–75 band". Zappa released ''Bongo Fury'' (1975), which featured live recordings from a tour the same year that reunited him with Captain Beefheart for a brief period. They later became estranged for a period of years, but were in contact at the end of Zappa's life.

Business breakups and touring (1976–1979)

Zappa's relationship with long-time manager Herb Cohen ended in 1976. Zappa sued Cohen for skimming more than he was allocated from DiscReet Records, as well as for signing acts of which Zappa did not approve. Cohen filed a lawsuit against Zappa in return, which froze the money Zappa and Cohen had gained from an out-of-court settlement with MGM over the rights of the early Mothers of Invention recordings. It also prevented Zappa having access to any of his previously recorded material during the trials. Zappa therefore took his personal master copies of the rock-oriented ''Zoot Allures'' (1976) directly to Warner Bros., thereby bypassing DiscReet.

In the mid-1970s Zappa prepared material for ''Läther'' (pronounced "leather"), a four-LP project. ''Läther'' encapsulated all the aspects of Zappa's musical styles — rock tunes, orchestral works, complex instrumentals, and Zappa's own trademark distortion-drenched guitar solos. Wary of a quadruple-LP, Warner Bros. Records refused to release it. Zappa managed to get an agreement with Mercury-Phonogram, and test pressings were made targeted at a Halloween 1977 release, but Warner Bros. prevented the release by claiming rights over the material. Zappa responded by appearing on the Pasadena, California radio station KROQ, allowing them to broadcast ''Läther'' and encouraging listeners to make their own tape recordings. A lawsuit between Zappa and Warner Bros. followed, during which no Zappa material was released for more than a year. Eventually, Warner Bros. issued major parts of ''Läther'' against Zappa's will as four individual albums with limited promotion. ''Läther'' was released posthumously in 1996.

Although Zappa eventually gained the rights to all his material created under the MGM and Warner Bros. contracts, the various lawsuits meant that for a period Zappa's only income came from touring, which he therefore did extensively in 1975–1977 with relatively small, mainly rock-oriented, bands. Drummer Terry Bozzio became a regular band member, Napoleon Murphy Brock stayed on for a while, and original Mothers of Invention bassist Roy Estrada joined. Among other musicians were bassist Patrick O'Hearn, singer-guitarist Ray White and keyboardist Eddie Jobson. In December 1976, Zappa appeared as a featured musical guest on the NBC television show ''Saturday Night Live''. The performances included an impromptu musical collaboration with cast member John Belushi during the instrumental piece "The Purple Lagoon". Belushi appeared as his Samurai Futaba character playing the tenor sax with Zappa conducting. Zappa's song, "I'm the Slime", was performed with a voice-over by ''SNL'' booth announcer Don Pardo, who also introduced "Peaches En Regalia" on the same airing.

Zappa's band at the time, with the additions of Ruth Underwood and a horn section (featuring Michael and Randy Brecker), performed during Christmas in New York, recordings of which appear on one of the albums released by Warner Bros., ''Zappa in New York'' (1978). It mixes intense instrumentals such as "The Black Page" and humorous songs like "Titties and Beer". The former composition, written originally for drum kit but later developed for larger bands, is notorious for its complexity in rhythmic structure, radical changes of tempo and meter, and short, densely arranged passages.

''Zappa in New York'' featured a song about sex criminal Michael H. Kenyon, "The Illinois Enema Bandit", which featured Don Pardo providing the opening narrative in the song. Like many songs on the album, it contained numerous sexual references, leading to many critics objecting and being offended by the content. Zappa dismissed the criticism by noting that he was a journalist reporting on life as he saw it. Predating his later fight against censorship, he remarked: "What do you make of a society that is so primitive that it clings to the belief that certain words in its language are so powerful that they could corrupt you the moment you hear them?" The remaining albums released by Warner Bros. Records without Zappa's consent were ''Studio Tan'' in 1978 and ''Sleep Dirt'' in 1979, which contained complex suites of instrumentally-based tunes recorded between 1973 and 1976, and whose release was overlooked in the midst of the legal problems. Also released by the label without the artist's consent was ''Orchestral Favorites'' in 1979, which featured recordings of a concert with orchestral music from 1975.

Zappa as an independent artist (1979)

Resolving the lawsuits successfully, Zappa ended the 1970s "stronger than ever", by releasing two of his most successful albums in 1979: the best selling album of his career, ''Sheik Yerbouti'', and the "bona fide masterpiece", ''Joe's Garage''. The double album ''Sheik Yerbouti'' was the first release on Zappa Records, and contained the Grammy-nominated single "Dancin' Fool", which reached No. 45 on the ''Billboard'' charts, and "Jewish Princess", which received attention when a Jewish lobby group, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), attempted to prevent the song from receiving radio airplay due to its alleged anti-Semitic lyrics. Zappa vehemently denied any anti-Semitic sentiments and dismissed the ADL as a "noisemaking organization that tries to apply pressure on people in order to manufacture a stereotype image of Jews that suits their idea of a good time". The album's commercial success was attributable in part to "Bobby Brown". Due to its explicit lyrics about a young man's encounter with a "dyke by the name of Freddie", the song did not get airplay in the U.S., but it topped the charts in several European countries where English is not the primary language. The triple LP ''Joe's Garage'' featured lead singer Ike Willis as the voice of the character "Joe" in a rock opera about the danger of political systems, the suppression of freedom of speech and music — inspired in part by the Islamic revolution that had made music illegal within its jurisdiction at the time — and about the "strange relationship Americans have with sex and sexual frankness". The album contains rock songs like "Catholic Girls" (a riposte to the controversies of "Jewish Princess"), "Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up", and the title track, as well as extended live-recorded guitar improvisations combined with a studio backup band dominated by drummer Vinnie Colaiuta (with whom Zappa had a particularly good musical rapport) adopting the xenochrony process. The album contains one of Zappa's most famous guitar "signature pieces", "Watermelon in Easter Hay".

On December 21, 1979, Zappa's movie ''Baby Snakes'' premiered in New York. The movie's tagline was "A movie about people who do stuff that is not normal". The 2 hour and 40 minutes movie was based on footage from concerts in New York around Halloween 1977, with a band featuring keyboardist Tommy Mars and percussionist Ed Mann (who would both return on later tours) as well as guitarist Adrian Belew. It also contained several extraordinary sequences of clay animation by Bruce Bickford who had earlier provided animation sequences to Zappa for a 1974 TV special (which later become available on the video ''The Dub Room Special'' (1982)). The movie did not do well in theatrical distribution, but won the Premier Grand Prix at the First International Music Festival in Paris in 1981. The Zappa Family Trust released it on DVD, and it has been available since 2003.

Zappa later expanded on his television appearances in a non-musical role. He was an actor or voice artist in episodes of ''Shelley Duvall's Faerie Tale Theatre'', ''Miami Vice'' and ''The Ren and Stimpy Show''. A voice part in ''The Simpsons'' never materialized, to creator Matt Groening's disappointment.

1980s: Productive as ever

After spending most of 1980 on the road, Zappa released ''Tinsel Town Rebellion'' in 1981. It was the first release on his own Barking Pumpkin Records, and it contains songs taken from a 1979 tour, one studio track and material from the 1980 tours. The album is a mixture of complicated instrumentals and Zappa's use of ''sprechstimme'' (speaking song or voice)—a compositional technique utilized by such composers as Arnold Schoenberg and Alban Berg — showcasing some of the most accomplished bands Zappa ever had (mostly featuring drummer Vinnie Colaiuta). While some lyrics still raised controversy among critics, in the sense that some found them sexist, the political and sociological satire in songs like the title track and "The Blue Light" have been described as a "hilarious critique of the willingness of the American people to believe anything". The album is also notable for the presence of guitar virtuoso Steve Vai, who joined Zappa's touring band in the fall of 1980.

The same year the double album ''You Are What You Is'' was released. Most of it was recorded in Zappa's brand new Utility Muffin Research Kitchen (UMRK) studios, which were located at his house, thereby giving him complete freedom to work. The album included one complex instrumental, "Theme from the 3^rd Movement of Sinister Footwear", but focused mainly on rock songs with Zappa's sardonic social commentary—satirical lyrics targeted at teenagers, the media, and religious and political hypocrisy. "Dumb All Over" is a tirade on religion, as is "Heavenly Bank Account", wherein Zappa rails against TV evangelists such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson for their purported influence on the U.S. administration as well as their use of religion as a means of raising money. Songs like "Society Pages" and "I'm a Beautiful Guy" show Zappa's dismay with the Reagan era and its "obscene pursuit of wealth and happiness". In 1981, Zappa also released three instrumental albums, ''Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar'', ''Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar Some More'', and ''The Return of the Son of Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar'', which were initially sold via mail order, but later released through the CBS label due to popular demand. The albums focus exclusively on Frank Zappa as a guitar soloist, and the tracks are predominantly live recordings from 1979–1980; they highlight Zappa's improvisational skills with "beautiful performances from the backing group as well". Another guitar-only album, ''Guitar'', was released in 1988, and a third, ''Trance-Fusion'', which Zappa completed shortly before his death, was released in 2006.

From hit single to classical performances

In May 1982, Zappa released ''Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch'', which featured his biggest selling single ever, the Grammy Award-nominated song "Valley Girl" (topping out at No. 32 on the ''Billboard'' charts). In her improvised lyrics to the song, Zappa's daughter Moon Unit satirized the vapid speech of teenage girls from the San Fernando Valley, which popularized many "Valspeak" expressions such as "gag me with a spoon," "fer sure, fer sure," "grody" (gross), and "barf out". Most Americans who only knew Zappa from his few singles successes now thought of him as a person writing "novelty songs", even though the rest of the album contained highly challenging music. Zappa was irritated by this and never played the song live.

In 1983, two different projects were released, beginning with ''The Man from Utopia,'' a rock-oriented work. The album is eclectic, featuring the vocal-led "Dangerous Kitchen" and "The Jazz Discharge Party Hats", both continuations of the sprechstimme excursions on ''Tinseltown Rebellion.'' The second album, ''London Symphony Orchestra, Vol. 1'', contained orchestral Zappa compositions conducted by Kent Nagano and performed by the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO). A second record of these sessions, ''London Symphony Orchestra, Vol. 2'' was released in 1987. The material was recorded under a tight schedule with Zappa providing all funding, helped by the commercial success of "Valley Girl". Zappa was not satisfied with the LSO recordings. One reason is "Strictly Genteel", which was recorded after the trumpet section had been out for drinks on a break: the track took 40 edits to hide out-of-tune notes. Conductor Nagano, who was pleased with the experience, noted that in "fairness to the orchestra, the music is humanly very, very difficult". Some reviews noted that the recordings were the best representation of Zappa's orchestral work so far. In 1984 Zappa teamed again with Nagano and the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra for a live performance of ''A Zappa Affair'' with augmented orchestra, life-size puppets, and moving stage sets. Although critically acclaimed the work was a financial failure, and only performed twice. Zappa was invited by conference organizer Thomas Wells to be the keynote speaker at the American Society of University Composers at the Ohio State University. It was there Zappa delivered his famous "Bingo! There Goes Your Tenure" address, and had two of his orchestra pieces, "Dupree's Paradise" and "Naval Aviation in Art?" performed by the Columbus Symphony and ProMusica Chamber Orchestra of Columbus.

Synclavier

For the remainder of his career, much of Zappa's work was influenced by his use of the Synclavier as a compositional and performance tool. Even considering the complexity of the music he wrote, the Synclavier could realize anything he could dream up. The Synclavier could be programmed to play almost anything conceivable, to perfection: "With the Synclavier, any group of imaginary instruments can be invited to play the most difficult passages ... with ''one-millisecond'' accuracy—every time". Even though it essentially did away with the need for musicians, Zappa viewed the Synclavier and real-life musicians as separate. In 1984, he released four albums. ''Boulez Conducts Zappa: The Perfect Stranger,'' contains orchestral works commissioned and conducted by world-renowned conductor Pierre Boulez (who was listed as an influence on ''Freak Out!'') and performed by his Ensemble InterContemporain, juxtaposed with premiere Synclavier pieces. Again, Zappa was not satisfied with the performances of his orchestral works as he found them under-rehearsed, but in the album liner notes he respectfully thanks Boulez's demands for precision. The Synclavier pieces stood in contrast to the orchestral works, as the sounds were electronically generated and not, as became possible shortly thereafter, sampled.

The album ''Thing-Fish'' was an ambitious three-record set in the style of a Broadway play dealing with a dystopian "what-if" scenario involving feminism, homosexuality, manufacturing and distribution of the AIDS virus, and a eugenics program conducted by the United States government. New vocals were combined with previously released tracks and new Synclavier music; "the work is an extraordinary example of bricolage". Finally, in 1984, Zappa released ''Francesco Zappa'', a Synclavier rendition of works by 18th century composer Francesco Zappa (no known relation), and ''Them or Us,'' a two-record set of heavily edited live and session pieces.

Senate testimony

On September 19, 1985, Zappa testified before the United States Senate Commerce, Technology, and Transportation committee, attacking the Parents Music Resource Center or PMRC, a music organization co-founded by Tipper Gore, wife of then-senator Al Gore. The PMRC consisted of many wives of politicians, including the wives of five members of the committee, and was founded to address the issue of song lyrics with sexual or satanic content. Zappa saw their activities as on a path towards censorship, and called their proposal for voluntary labelling of records with explicit content "extortion" of the music industry. In his prepared statement, he said:

The PMRC proposal is an ill-conceived piece of nonsense which fails to deliver any real benefits to children, infringes the civil liberties of people who are not children, and promises to keep the courts busy for years dealing with the interpretational and enforcemental problems inherent in the proposal's design. It is my understanding that, in law, First Amendment issues are decided with a preference for the least restrictive alternative. In this context, the PMRC's demands are the equivalent of treating dandruff by decapitation ... The establishment of a rating system, voluntary or otherwise, opens the door to an endless parade of moral quality control programs based on things certain Christians do not like. What if the next bunch of Washington wives demands a large yellow "J" on all material written or performed by Jews, in order to save helpless children from exposure to concealed Zionist doctrine?

Zappa set excerpts from the PMRC hearings to Synclavier music in his composition "Porn Wars" on the 1985 album ''Frank Zappa Meets the Mothers of Prevention'', and the full recording was released in 2010 as ''Congress Shall Make No Law...''. Zappa is heard interacting with Senators Fritz Hollings, Slade Gorton, Al Gore (who claimed, at the hearing, to be a Zappa fan), and in an exchange with Florida Senator Paula Hawkins over what toys Zappa's children played with. Zappa expressed opinions on censorship when he appeared on CNN's ''Crossfire TV series'' and debated issues with ''Washington Times'' commentator John Lofton in 1986. Zappa's passion for American politics was becoming a bigger part of his life. He had always encouraged his fans to register to vote on album covers, and throughout 1988 he had registration booths at his concerts. He even considered running for President of the United States.

Digital medium and last tour

Around 1986, Zappa undertook a comprehensive re-release program of his earlier vinyl recordings. He personally oversaw the remastering of all his 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s albums for the new digital compact disc medium. Certain aspects of these re-issues were, however, criticized by some fans as being unfaithful to the original recordings. Nearly twenty years before the advent of online music stores, Zappa had proposed to replace "phonographic record merchandising" of music by "direct digital-to-digital transfer" through phone or cable TV (with royalty payments and consumer billing automatically built into the accompanying software). In 1989, Zappa considered his idea a "miserable flop".

The album ''Jazz From Hell,'' released in 1986, earned Zappa his first Grammy Award in 1987 for Best Rock Instrumental Performance. Except for one live guitar solo (St. Etienne), the album exclusively featured compositions brought to life by the Synclavier. Although an instrumental album, containing no lyrics whatsoever, Meyer Music Markets sold ''Jazz from Hell'' featuring an "explicit lyrics" sticker — a warning label introduced by the Recording Industry Association of America in an agreement with the PMRC.

Zappa's last tour in a rock and jazz band format took place in 1988 with a 12-piece group which had a repertoire of over 100 (mostly Zappa) compositions, but which split under acrimonious circumstances before the tour was completed. The tour was documented on the albums ''Broadway the Hard Way'' (new material featuring songs with strong political emphasis), ''The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life'' (Zappa "standards" and an eclectic collection of cover tunes, ranging from Maurice Ravel's ''Boléro'' to Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven"), and ''Make a Jazz Noise Here'' (mostly instrumental and avant-garde music). Parts are also found on ''You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore'', volumes 4 and 6.

1990s: Classical music and death

In early 1990, Zappa visited Czechoslovakia at the request of President Václav Havel, and was asked to serve as consultant for the government on trade, cultural matters and tourism. Havel was a lifelong fan of Zappa who had great influence in the avant-garde and underground scene in Central Europe in the 1970s and 1980s (a Czech rock group that was imprisoned in 1976 took its name from Zappa's 1968 song "Plastic People"). Zappa enthusiastically agreed and began meeting with corporate officials interested in investing in Czechoslovakia. Within a few weeks, however, the U.S. administration put pressure on the Czech government to withdraw the appointment. Havel made Zappa an unofficial cultural attaché instead. Zappa also planned to develop an international consulting enterprise to facilitate trade between the former Eastern Bloc and Western businesses. Most of Zappa's projects came to a halt in 1990, when he was diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer. The disease had been developing unnoticed for ten years and was considered inoperable. After his diagnosis, Zappa devoted most of his energy to modern orchestral and Synclavier works. In 1993 he completed ''Civilization, Phaze III'' shortly before his death. It was a major Synclavier work which he had begun in the 1980s.

In 1991, Zappa was chosen to be one of four featured composers at the world-acclaimed Frankfurt Festival in 1992 (the others were John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Alexander Knaifel). Zappa was approached by the German chamber ensemble, Ensemble Modern, which was interested in playing his music for the event. Although ill, Zappa invited them to Los Angeles for rehearsals of new compositions and new arrangements of older material. In addition to being satisfied with the ensemble's performances of his music, Zappa also got along with the musicians, and the concerts in Germany and Austria were set up for the fall. In September 1992, the concerts went ahead as scheduled, but Zappa could only appear at two in Frankfurt due to illness. At the first concert, he conducted the opening "Overture", and the final "G-Spot Tornado" as well as the theatrical "Food Gathering in Post-Industrial America, 1992" and "Welcome to the United States" (the remainder of the program was conducted by the ensemble's regular conductor Peter Rundel). Zappa received a 20-minute ovation. It would become his last professional public appearance, as the cancer was spreading to such an extent that he was in too much pain to enjoy an event that he otherwise found "exhilarating". Recordings from the concerts appeared on ''The Yellow Shark'' (1993), Zappa's last release during his lifetime, and some material from studio rehearsals appeared on the posthumous ''Everything Is Healing Nicely'' (1999).

Frank Zappa died on Saturday, December 4, 1993 in his home surrounded by his wife and children. At a private ceremony the following day, Zappa was interred in an unmarked grave at the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Westwood, Los Angeles, next to the grave of actor Lew Ayres. On Monday, December 6 his family publicly announced that "Composer Frank Zappa left for his final tour just before 6:00 pm on Saturday".

Legacy

Acclaim and honors

Zappa earned widespread critical acclaim in his lifetime and after his death. ''The Rolling Stone Album Guide'' (2004) writes: "Frank Zappa dabbled in virtually all kinds of music — and, whether guised as a satirical rocker, jazz-rock fusionist, guitar virtuoso, electronics wizard, or orchestral innovator, his eccentric genius was undeniable". Even though his work drew inspiration from many different genres, Zappa was seen establishing a coherent and personal expression. In 1971, biographer David Walley noted that "The whole structure of his music is unified, not neatly divided by dates or time sequences and it is all building into a composite". On commenting on Zappa's music, politics and philosophy, Barry Miles noted in 2004 that they cannot be separated: "It was all one; all part of his 'conceptual continuity. ''Guitar Player'' devoted a special issue to Zappa in 1992, and asked on the cover "Is FZ America's Best Kept Musical Secret?" Editor Don Menn remarked that the issue was about "The most important composer to come out of modern popular music". Among those contributing to the issue was composer and musicologist Nicolas Slonimsky, who conducted premiere performances of works of Ives and Varèse in the 1930s. He became friends with Zappa in the 1980s, and said "I admire everything Frank does, because he practically created the new musical millennium. He does beautiful, beautiful work ... It has been my luck to have lived to see the emergence of this totally new type of music." Conductor Kent Nagano remarked in the same issue that "Frank is a genius. That's a word I don't use often ... In Frank's case it is not too strong ... He is extremely literate musically. I'm not sure if the general public knows that". Pierre Boulez stated in ''Musician'' magazine's posthumous Zappa tribute article that Zappa "was an exceptional figure because he was part of the worlds of rock and classical music and that both types of his work would survive." Many music scholars acknowledge Zappa as one of the most influential composers of his generation. As an electric guitarist, he has become highly regarded.

In 1994, jazz magazine ''Down Beat'''s critics poll placed Zappa in its Hall of Fame. Zappa was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995. There, it was written that "Frank Zappa was rock and roll's sharpest musical mind and most astute social critic. He was the most prolific composer of his age, and he bridged genres — rock, jazz, classical, avant-garde and even novelty music — with masterful ease". He received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997. In 2005, the U.S. National Recording Preservation Board included ''We're Only in It for the Money'' in the National Recording Registry as "Frank Zappa's inventive and iconoclastic album presents a unique political stance, both anti-conservative and anti-counterculture, and features a scathing satire on hippiedom and America's reactions to it". The same year, ''Rolling Stone'' magazine ranked him at No. 71 on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2011, he was ranked at No. 45 on the list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time by the same magazine.

Artists influenced by Zappa

A number of notable musicians, bands and orchestras from diverse genres have been influenced by Frank Zappa's music. Rock artists like Alice Cooper, Primus, Fee Waybill of The Tubes all cite Zappa's influence, as do progressive rock artists like Henry Cow, Trey Anastasio of Phish, and John Frusciante. Paul McCartney regarded ''Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'' as The Beatles' ''Freak Out!'' Heavy rock and metal acts like Black Sabbath, Mike Portnoy, Warren DeMartini, Steve Vai, Strapping Young Lad, System of a Down, Clawfinger, and Devin Townsend acknowledge Zappa's inspiration. On the classical music scene, Tomas Ulrich, Meridian Arts Ensemble, Ensemble Ambrosius and the Fireworks Ensemble regularly perform Zappa's compositions and quote his influence. Contemporary jazz musicians and composers Bill Frisell and John Zorn are inspired by Zappa, as is funk legend George Clinton. Other artists whose work is affected by Zappa include new age pianist George Winston, electronic composer Bob Gluck, parody singer "Weird Al" Yankovic, industrial music pioneer Genesis P-Orridge, and noise music artist Masami Akita of Merzbow.

References in arts and sciences

Scientists from various fields have honored Zappa by naming new discoveries after him. In 1967, paleontologist Leo P. Plas, Jr. identified an extinct mollusc in Nevada and named it ''Amaurotoma zappa'' with the motivation that, "The specific name, ''zappa'', honors Frank Zappa". In the 1980s, biologist Ed Murdy named a genus of gobiid fishes of New Guinea ''Zappa'', with a species named ''Zappa confluentus''. Biologist Ferdinando Boero named a Californian jellyfish ''Phialella zappai'' (1987), noting that he had "pleasure in naming this species after the modern music composer". Belgian biologists Bosmans and Bosselaers discovered in the early 1980s a Cameroonese spider, which they in 1994 named ''Pachygnatha zappa'' because "the ventral side of the abdomen of the female of this species strikingly resembles the artist's legendary moustache". A gene of the bacterium ''Proteus mirabilis'' that causes urinary tract infections was in 1995 named ''zapA'' by three biologists from Maryland. In their scientific article, they "especially thank the late Frank Zappa for inspiration and assistance with genetic nomenclature". In the late 1990s, American paleontologists Marc Salak and Halard L. Lescinsky discovered a metazoan fossil, and named it ''Spygori zappania'' to honor "the late Frank Zappa ... whose mission paralleled that of the earliest paleontologists: to challenge conventional and traditional beliefs when such beliefs lacked roots in logic and reason".

In 1994, lobbying efforts initiated by psychiatrist John Scialli led the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center to name an asteroid in Zappa's honor: ''3834 Zappafrank''. The asteroid was discovered in 1980 by Czechoslovakian astronomer Ladislav Brozek, and the citation for its naming says that "Zappa was an eclectic, self-trained artist and composer ... Before 1989 he was regarded as a symbol of democracy and freedom by many people in Czechoslovakia".

In 1995, a bust of Zappa by sculptor Konstantinas Bogdanas was installed in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius. A replica was offered to the city of Baltimore in 2008, and on September 19, 2010 — the twenty-fifth anniversary of Zappa's testimony to the U.S. Senate — a ceremony dedicating the replica was held, with the bust installed at the Southeast Anchor Branch Library in Baltimore's Highlandtown. Speakers at the event included Gail Zappa and Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake In 2002, a bronze bust was installed in German city Bad Doberan, since 1990 location of the ''Zappanale'', an annual music festival celebrating Zappa. At the initiative of musicians community ORWOhaus, the city of Berlin named a street in the Marzahn district "Frank-Zappa-Straße" in 2007. The same year, Baltimore's mayor Sheila Dixon proclaimed August 9 as the city's official "Frank Zappa Day" citing Zappa's musical accomplishments as well as his defense of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Discography

References

Notes

External links

The official Frank Zappa website

Category:1940 births Category:1993 deaths Category:20th-century classical composers Category:American atheists Category:American blues guitarists Category:American comedy musicians Category:American composers Category:American experimental filmmakers Category:American experimental musicians Category:American humanists Category:American jazz guitarists Category:American musicians of Italian descent Category:American multi-instrumentalists Category:American people of Arab descent Category:American people of French descent Category:American people of Greek descent Category:American people of Sicilian descent Category:American rock guitarists Category:American rock singers Category:American satirists Category:American voice actors Category:Burials at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:Captain Beefheart Category:Censorship in the arts Category:Comedy rock Category:Contemporary classical music performers Category:Deaths from prostate cancer Category:Experimental composers Category:Free speech activists Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners Category:Lead guitarists Category:Musicians from California Category:People from Baltimore, Maryland Category:People from Echo Park, Los Angeles Category:People from Harford County, Maryland Category:Progressive rock musicians Category:Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees Category:Rykodisc artists Category:Songwriters from Maryland Category:The Mothers of Invention members Category:Verve Records artists Category:Warner Bros. Records artists

ar:فرانك زابا ast:Frank Zappa bs:Frank Zappa br:Frank Zappa bg:Франк Запа ca:Frank Zappa cs:Frank Zappa da:Frank Zappa de:Frank Zappa et:Frank Zappa el:Φρανκ Ζάπα es:Frank Zappa eo:Frank Zappa fa:فرانک زاپا fr:Frank Zappa fy:Frank Zappa gd:Frank Zappa gl:Frank Zappa ko:프랭크 자파 hr:Frank Zappa io:Frank Zappa id:Frank Zappa ia:Frank Zappa it:Frank Zappa he:פרנק זאפה ka:ფრენკ ზაპა la:Franciscus Zappa lv:Frenks Zapa lb:Frank Zappa hu:Frank Zappa nl:Frank Zappa ja:フランク・ザッパ no:Frank Zappa nn:Frank Zappa pl:Frank Zappa pt:Frank Zappa ro:Frank Zappa ru:Заппа, Фрэнк Винсент scn:Frank Zappa simple:Frank Zappa sk:Frank Zappa sl:Frank Zappa sr:Френк Запа sh:Frank Zappa fi:Frank Zappa sv:Frank Zappa tr:Frank Zappa uk:Френк Заппа zh:弗兰克·扎帕

name	Ornette Coleman
background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
born	March 09, 1930Fort Worth, Texas, United States
instrument	alto saxophone, tenor saxophone, violin, trumpet
genre	free jazz, free funk, , jazz-rock
occupation	musician, composer
years active	1958–present
website	ornettecoleman.com
notable instruments	}}

Ornette Coleman (born March 9, 1930) is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s.

Coleman's timbre is easily recognized: his keening, crying sound draws heavily on blues music. His album ''Sound Grammar'' received the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for music.

Early career

Coleman was born and raised in Fort Worth, Texas, where he began performing R&B; and bebop initially on tenor saxophone. Seeking a way to work his way out of his home town, he took a job in 1949 with a Silas Green from New Orleans traveling show and then with touring rhythm and blues shows. After a show in Baton Rouge, he was assaulted and his saxophone was destroyed.

He switched to alto, which has remained his primary instrument, first playing it in New Orleans after the Baton Rouge incident. He then joined the band of Pee Wee Crayton and travelled with them to Los Angeles. He worked at various jobs, including as an elevator operator, while still pursuing his musical career.

Even from the beginning of Coleman's career, his music and playing were in many ways unorthodox. His approach to harmony and chord progression was far less rigid than that of bebop performers; he was increasingly interested in playing what he heard rather than fitting it into predetermined chorus-structures and harmonies. His raw, highly vocalized sound and penchant for playing "in the cracks" of the scale led many Los Angeles jazz musicians to regard Coleman's playing as out-of-tune; he sometimes had difficulty finding like-minded musicians with whom to perform. Nevertheless, pianist Paul Bley was an early supporter and musical collaborator.

In 1958 Coleman led his first recording session for Contemporary, ''Something Else!!!!: The Music of Ornette Coleman''. The session also featured trumpeter Don Cherry, drummer Billy Higgins, bassist Don Payne and Walter Norris on piano.

The Shape of Jazz to Come

Coleman was very busy in 1959. His last release on Contemporary was ''Tomorrow Is the Question!'', a quartet album, with Shelly Manne on drums, and excluding the piano, which he would not use again until the 1990s. Next Coleman brought double bassist Charlie Haden – one of a handful of his most important collaborators – into a regular group with Haden, Cherry, and Higgins. (All four had played with Paul Bley the previous year.) He signed a multi-album contract with Atlantic Records who released ''The Shape of Jazz to Come'' in 1959. It was, according to critic Steve Huey, "a watershed event in the genesis of avant-garde jazz, profoundly steering its future course and throwing down a gauntlet that some still haven't come to grips with." While definitely – if somewhat loosely – blues-based and often quite melodic, the album's compositions were considered at that time harmonically unusual and unstructured. Some musicians and critics saw Coleman as an iconoclast; others, including conductor Leonard Bernstein and composer Virgil Thomson regarded him as a genius and an innovator.

Coleman's quartet received a lengthy – and sometimes controversial – engagement at New York City's famed Five Spot jazz club. Such notable figures as The Modern Jazz Quartet, Leonard Bernstein and Lionel Hampton were favorably impressed, and offered encouragement. (Hampton was so impressed he reportedly asked to perform with the quartet; Bernstein later helped Haden obtain a composition grant from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.) Opinion was, however, divided: trumpeter Miles Davis famously declared Coleman was "all screwed up inside" (although this comment was later recanted) and Roy Eldridge stated, "I'd listened to him all kinds of ways. I listened to him high and I listened to him cold sober. I even played with him. I think he's jiving baby."

On the Atlantic recordings, Scott LaFaro sometimes replaces Charlie Haden on double bass and either Billy Higgins or Ed Blackwell features on drums. These recordings are collected in a boxed set, ''Beauty Is a Rare Thing''.

Part of the uniqueness of Coleman's early sound came from his use of a plastic saxophone. He had first bought a plastic horn in Los Angeles in 1954 because he was unable to afford a metal saxophone, though he didn't like the sound of the plastic instrument at first. Coleman later claimed that it sounded drier, without the pinging sound of metal.

In more recent years, he has played a metal saxophone.

Free Jazz

In 1960, Coleman recorded ''Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation'', which featured a double quartet, including Cherry and Freddie Hubbard on trumpet, Eric Dolphy on bass clarinet, Haden and LaFaro on bass, and both Higgins and Blackwell on drums. The record was recorded in stereo, with a reed/brass/bass/Drums quartet isolated in each stereo channel. ''Free Jazz'' was, at nearly 40 minutes, the lengthiest recorded continuous jazz performance to date, and was instantly one of Coleman's most controversial albums. The music features a regular but complex pulse, one drummer playing "straight" while the other played double-time; the thematic material is a series of brief, dissonant fanfares; as is conventional in jazz, there are a series of solo features for each member of the band, but the other soloists are free to chime in as they wish, producing some extraordinary passages of collective improvisation by the full octet.

Coleman intended 'Free Jazz' simply to be the album title, but his growing reputation placed him at the forefront of jazz innovation, and free jazz was soon considered a new genre, though Coleman has expressed discomfort with the term.

Among the reasons Coleman may not have entirely approved of the term 'free jazz' is that his music contains a considerable amount of composition. His melodic material, although skeletal, strongly recalls the melodies that Charlie Parker wrote over standard harmonies, and in general the music is closer to the bebop that came before it than is sometimes popularly imagined. (Several early tunes of his, for instance, are clearly based on favorite bop chord changes like "Out of Nowhere" and "I Got Rhythm.") Coleman very rarely played standards, concentrating on his own compositions, of which there seems to be an endless flow. There are exceptions, though, including a classic reading (virtually a recomposition) of "Embraceable You" for Atlantic, and an improvisation on Thelonious Monk's "Criss-Cross" recorded with Gunther Schuller.

1960s

After the Atlantic period and into the early part of the 1970s, Coleman's music became more angular and engaged fully with the jazz avant-garde which had developed in part around Coleman's innovations.

His quartet dissolved, and Coleman formed a new trio with David Izenzon on bass, and Charles Moffett on drums. Coleman began to extend the sound-range of his music, introducing accompanying string players (though far from the territory of "Parker With Strings") and playing trumpet and violin himself; he initially had little conventional technique, and used the instruments to make large, unrestrained gestures; he plays the violin left-handed. His friendship with Albert Ayler influenced his development on trumpet and violin. (Haden would later sometimes join this trio to form a two-bass quartet.)

Between 1965 and 1967 Coleman signed with Blue Note Records and released a number of recordings starting with the influential recordings of the trio ''At the Golden Circle Stockholm''.

In 1966, Coleman was criticized for recording ''The Empty Foxhole,'' a trio with Haden, and Coleman's son Denardo Coleman – who was ten years old. Some regarded this as perhaps an ill-advised piece of publicity on Coleman's part, and judged the move a mistake. Others, however, noted that despite his youth, Denardo had studied drumming for several years, his technique – which, though unrefined, was respectable and enthusiastic – owed more to pulse-oriented free jazz drummers like Sunny Murray than to bebop drumming. Denardo has matured into a respected musician, and has been his father's primary drummer since the late 1970s.

Coleman formed another quartet. A number of bassists and drummers (including Haden, Jimmy Garrison and Elvin Jones) appeared, and Dewey Redman joined the group, usually on tenor saxophone.

He also continued to explore his interest in string textures – from the Town Hall concert in 1962, culminating in ''Skies of America'' in 1972. (Sometimes this had a practical value, as it facilitated his group's appearance in the UK in 1965, where jazz musicians were under a quota arrangement but classical performers were exempt.)

In 1969, Coleman was inducted into the ''Down Beat'' Jazz Hall of Fame

Later career

Coleman, like Miles Davis before him, took to playing with electrified instruments. Albums like ''Virgin Beauty'' and ''Of Human Feelings'' used rock and funk rhythms, sometimes called free funk. On the face of it, this could seem to be an adoption of the jazz fusion mode fashionable at the time, but Ornette's first record with the group, which later became known as Prime Time (the 1976 ''Dancing in Your Head''), was sufficiently different to have considerable shock value. Electric guitars were prominent, but the music was, at heart, rather similar to his earlier work. These performances have the same angular melodies and simultaneous group improvisations – what Joe Zawinul referred to as "nobody solos, everybody solos" and what Coleman calls ''harmolodics''—and although the nature of the pulse has altered, Coleman's own rhythmic approach has not.

Some critics have suggested Coleman's frequent use of the vaguely-defined term ''harmolodics'' is a musical MacGuffin: a red herring of sorts designed to occupy critics overly-focused on Coleman's sometimes unorthodox compositional style.

Jerry Garcia played guitar on three tracks from Coleman's ''Virgin Beauty'' (1988) - "Three Wishes," "Singing In The Shower," and "Desert Players." Coleman joined the Grateful Dead on stage twice in 1993 playing the band's "The Other One," "Wharf Rat," "Stella Blue," and covering Bobby Bland's "Turn On Your Lovelight," among others. Another unexpected association was with guitarist Pat Metheny, with whom Coleman recorded ''Song X'' (1985); though released under Metheny's name, Coleman was essentially co-leader (contributing all the compositions).

In 1990 the city of Reggio Emilia in Italy held a three-day "Portrait of the Artist" featuring a Coleman quartet with Don Cherry, Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins. The festival also presented performances of his chamber music and the symphonic ''Skies of America''.

In 1991, Coleman played on the soundtrack for David Cronenberg's ''Naked Lunch''; the orchestra was conducted by Howard Shore. It is notable among other things for including a rare sighting of Coleman playing a jazz standard: Thelonious Monk's blues line “Misterioso.” Two 1972 (pre-electric) Coleman recordings, "Happy House" and "Foreigner in a Free Land" were used in Gus Van Sant's 1995 ''Finding Forrester.

The mid-1990s saw a flurry of activity from Coleman: he released four records in 1995 and 1996, and for the first time in many years worked regularly with piano players (either Geri Allen or Joachim Kühn).

Coleman has rarely performed on other musicians' records. Exceptions include extensive performances on albums by Jackie McLean in 1967 (''New and Old Gospel'', on which he played trumpet), and James Blood Ulmer in 1978, and cameo appearances on Yoko Ono's ''Plastic Ono Band'' album (1970), Jamaaladeen Tacuma's ''Renaissance Man'' (1983), Joe Henry's ''Scar'' (2001) and Lou Reed's ''The Raven'' (2003).

In September 2006 he released a live album titled ''Sound Grammar'' with his newest quartet (Denardo drumming and two bassists, Gregory Cohen and Tony Falanga). This is his first album of new material in ten years, and was recorded in Germany in 2005. It won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for music.

Jazz pianist Joanne Brackeen (who had only briefly studied music as a child) stated in an interview with Marian McPartland that Coleman has been mentoring her and giving her semi-formal music lessons in recent years.

Legacy

Coleman continues to push himself into unusual playing situations, often with much younger musicians or musicians from radically different musical cultures, and still performs regularly. An increasing number of his compositions, while not ubiquitous, have become minor jazz standards, including "Lonely Woman," "Peace," "Turnaround," "When Will the Blues Leave?" "The Blessing," "Law Years," "What Reason Could I Give" and "I've Waited All My Life", among others. He has influenced virtually every saxophonist of a modern disposition, and nearly every such jazz musician, of the generation that followed him. His songs have proven endlessly malleable: pianists such as Paul Bley and Paul Plimley have managed to turn them to their purposes; John Zorn recorded ''Spy vs Spy'' (1989), an album of extremely loud, fast, and abrupt versions of Coleman songs. Finnish jazz singer Carola covered Coleman's "Lonely Woman" and there have even been progressive bluegrass versions of Coleman tunes (by Richard Greene). Coleman's playing has profoundly influenced, directly or otherwise, countless musicians, trying as he has for five decades to understand and discover the shape of not just jazz, but all music to come.

In 2004 Coleman was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to “a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind’s enjoyment and understanding of life.”

On February 11, 2007, Ornette Coleman was honored with a Grammy award for lifetime achievement, in recognition of this legacy.

On July 9, 2009, Ornette Coleman received the Miles Davis Award, a recognition given by the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal to jazz musicians who have contributed along their careers to the evolution of the jazz music.

On May 1, 2010, Ornette was awarded a honorary doctorate in Music from the University of Michigan for his musical contributions.

Meltdown Festival

Ornette Coleman was the curator of the 16th annual Meltdown festival held in June 2009 at London's Southbank Centre, following in the footsteps of previous curators including David Bowie, Patti Smith, John Peel and Lee 'Scratch' Perry. The line-up included Moby, The Roots, Yoko Ono's Plastic Ono Band (with whom Coleman performed), Charlie Haden, Yo La Tengo, and The Master Musicians of Jajouka led by Bachir Attar, Patti Smith among others.

Discography

Notes

References

Coleman, Ornette. Interview with Andy Hamilton. ''A Question of Scale'' The Wire July 2005.

Interview with Eldridge, Roy. Esquire March 1961.

External links

Official web site

Concert Photos, Caravan of Dreams, 1985

Article on Coleman's early music

Interview (1997)

Interview (1996)

Interview (1995)

Interview (1985)

''Ornette: Made in America '' 1985 documentary about Ornette Coleman directed by Shirley Clarke, re-released on DVD in 2007.

Tone Dialing: A Conversation on Friendship with Ornette Coleman

Ornette Coleman tribute by Jazz at Lincoln Center

Jazz Conversations with Eric Jackson: Ornette Coleman (Part 1) from WGBH Radio Boston

Jazz Conversations with Eric Jackson: Ornette Coleman (Part 2) from WGBH Radio Boston

Category:1930 births Category:Living people Category:Free jazz saxophonists Category:Free funk saxophonists Category:Avant-garde jazz musicians Category:African American musicians Category:American jazz saxophonists Category:American jazz violinists Category:People from Fort Worth, Texas Category:Jazz alto saxophonists Category:MacArthur Fellows Category:Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners Category:Pulitzer Prize for Music winners Category:Atlantic Records artists Category:ABC Records artists Category:Antilles Records artists Category:Blue Note Records artists Category:ESP-Disk artists

an:Ornette Coleman bs:Ornette Coleman cs:Ornette Coleman da:Ornette Coleman de:Ornette Coleman et:Ornette Coleman es:Ornette Coleman eo:Ornette Coleman fr:Ornette Coleman gl:Ornette Coleman io:Ornette Coleman it:Ornette Coleman he:אורנט קולמן sw:Ornette Coleman nl:Ornette Coleman ja:オーネット・コールマン no:Ornette Coleman oc:Ornette Coleman pl:Ornette Coleman pt:Ornette Coleman ru:Коулман, Орнетт simple:Ornette Coleman fi:Ornette Coleman sv:Ornette Coleman tr:Ornette Coleman uk:Орнетт Коулман

name	Howard Shore
background	non_performing_personnel
birth name	Howard Leslie Shore
born	October 18, 1946Toronto, Ontario, Canada
occupation	composer, orchestrator, conductor, music producer
genre	Classical, Orchestra, Film Score
years active	1978–present
website	howardshore.com }}

Howard Leslie Shore (born October 18, 1946) is a Canadian composer, notable for his film scores. He has composed the scores for over 80 films, most notably the scores for ''The Lord of the Rings'' film trilogy, for which he won three Academy Awards. He is also a consistent collaborator with director David Cronenberg, having scored all but one of his films since 1979. Shore has also worked with Martin Scorsese, Jonathan Demme, David Fincher and many other filmmakers.

He has also composed a few concert works including one opera, ''The Fly'', based on the plot (though not his score) of Cronenberg's 1986 film premiered at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris on 2 July 2008., a short piece Fanfare for the Wanamaker Organ and the Philadelphia Orchestra, and a short overture for the Swiss 21st Century Symphony Orchestra.

Shore is a three-time winner of the Academy Award, and has also won two Golden Globe Awards and four Grammy Awards. He is the uncle of film composer Ryan Shore.

Early life and career

Shore was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, the son of Bernice (née Ash) and Mac Shore. He studied music at Berklee College of Music in Boston after graduating from Forest Hill Collegiate Institute. From 1969 to 1972, he performed with the group Lighthouse. In 1970 he was the music director of Lorne Michaels and Hart Pomerantz's short-lived TV program ''The Hart & Lorne Terrific Hour''. Shore wrote the music for Canadian magician Doug Henning's magical/musical ''Spellbound'' in 1974, and he was the musical director for Lorne Michaels' hugely influential late-night NBC comedy show ''Saturday Night Live'' from 1975 to 1980, appearing in many musical sketches, including Howard Shore and His All-Nurse Band, and dressed as a beekeeper for a John Belushi/Dan Aykroyd performance of the Slim Harpo classic ''I'm a King Bee''. Shore also suggested the name for The Blues Brothers to Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi.

Film scoring

1979–2000

Shore's first film score was to David Cronenberg's first major film ''The Brood'' (1979). He would go on to score all of Cronenberg's subsequent films, with the exception of The Dead Zone (1983), which was scored by Michael Kamen. The first film he scored that was not directed by Cronenberg was Martin Scorsese's ''After Hours''.

Following ''After Hours'', he scored ''The Fly'' (1986), again directed by Cronenberg. Two years later, he composed the score to ''Big'' (1988), directed by Penny Marshall and starring Tom Hanks. He then scored two more of David Cronenberg's films: ''Dead Ringers'' (1988) and ''Naked Lunch'' (1991).

During 1991, Shore composed the score for the highly acclaimed film ''The Silence of the Lambs'', starring Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins, and directed by Jonathan Demme. He received his first BAFTA nomination for the score. The film became the third (and most recent) to win the five major Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actor, and Best Actress). Shore is the only living composer to have scored a "Top Five" Oscar winning film.

During 1993, he composed the scores for ''M. Butterfly'' (another collaboration with Cronenberg), ''Philadelphia'' (his second collaboration with Jonathan Demme), and ''Mrs. Doubtfire'', directed by Chris Columbus. The latter two films were highly successful; ''Philadelphia'' winning Tom Hanks his first Oscar.

Shore scored another three films in 1994: ''The Client'', ''Ed Wood'', and ''Nobody's Fool''. ''Ed Wood'' is notable for being one of the two films directed by Tim Burton that did not feature a score by Danny Elfman.

Shore continued to score numerous films from 1995–2001, including two David Fincher films, ''Seven'' (1995) and ''The Game'' (1997); also, he collaborated on two films with Cronenberg along with Tom Hanks' directorial debut, ''That Thing You Do!''.

2001–2005

Shore's major success came in 2001 with his score to ''The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring'', the first film in the highly acclaimed ''The Lord of the Rings trilogy''. The news that Shore would score the trilogy surprised some, since he was primarily associated with dark, ominous films and had never scored an epic of this scale. However, the score was hugely successful and won Shore his first Oscar, as well as a Grammy Award, and nominations for a Golden Globe and a BAFTA.

The following year, Shore composed the scores to ''Panic Room'', ''Gangs of New York'' (replacing Elmer Bernstein), and ''The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers'', the second film in the trilogy. The latter two films were both nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, although neither won. Shore's score for ''The Two Towers'' was deemed ineligible for submission to the Academy, due to a new rule that disallowed the submission of scores which contained themes from previous work. This rule proved very unpopular, due to the fact that had it been present in earlier years, it would have invalidated various other sequel scores (such as ''Star Wars'' and ''Indiana Jones'') from being nominated. As a result the Academy dispensed with this rule for future years. Shore did, however, receive a BAFTA nomination for ''Gangs of New York''.

In 2003 he composed the score for the final film in ''The Lord of the Rings trilogy'', ''The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King''. The film was the most successful film in the trilogy and the most successful of the year. Shore won his second Oscar for Best Original Score, as well as a third for Best Original Song for "Into the West", which he shared with Fran Walsh and Annie Lennox. The film was nominated for, and won a total of eleven Academy Awards, a record for the number of Oscars won by a single film, and a record that only two other films—Titanic (1997) and Ben-Hur (1959)—have matched. Shore also won his first Golden Globe, his third and fourth Grammy (the fourth for Best Song), and was nominated for a third BAFTA. The scores of ''The Lord of the Rings'' became one of the most successful film scores ever written, and the biggest success in Shore's career.

In 2004, Shore again collaborated with Martin Scorsese, scoring his epic film ''The Aviator''. He won a second Golden Globe for the score, becoming the first, and to date, the only, composer to have won consecutive Golden Globes in the Original Score category. He also received his sixth Grammy nominations, and his fifth BAFTA nomination.

He collaborated again with David Cronenberg in 2005 to score ''A History of Violence'', starring Viggo Mortensen. The film was a success and received two Oscar nominations. In 2006, he collaborated for the fourth time with Martin Scorsese, this time to score ''The Departed''. The film was highly successful and won four Oscars, including a long awaited win for Scorsese, and Best Picture.

Although Shore was originally commissioned to compose the soundtrack for ''King Kong'' (indeed, he had already recorded most of the music), he was later replaced by James Newton Howard due to "differing creative aspirations for the score" on his and the filmmakers' parts. This was a mutual agreement between himself and Peter Jackson. Despite this, Shore has a cameo near the end of ''King Kong'' as the conductor of the pit orchestra in the theater, performing portions of Max Steiner's score to the ''original 1933 version'' of the film.

2006–Present

In 2007, he composed the music for ''Soul of the Ultimate Nation'', an online multiplayer video game. The soundtrack is notable for being the first video game soundtrack to feature Lydia Kavina on the theremin. During 2007 he also composed the scores to ''The Last Mimzy'', and ''Eastern Promises'', the latter of which was another collaboration with David Cronenberg and earned Shore his fourth Golden Globe nomination. In 2008 he scored ''Doubt'', starring Meryl Streep and directed by John Patrick Shanley. The film was a success, earning five Oscar nominations.

In 2010, Shore composed the score to the ''third installment'' in the highly popular ''Twilight'' film series, following Carter Burwell and Alexandre Desplat, who scored the first and second films, respectively. He also replaced John Corigliano to score ''Edge of Darkness'', starring Mel Gibson.

Shore's next two projects are ''A Dangerous Method'', continuing his long-term collaboration with director David Cronenberg. He will also compose the score to Martin Scorsese's ''Hugo Cabret'', which will be his fifth collaboration with Scorsese. Both films are currently in post-production.

Shore's future projects include Robert Sigl's ''The Spider'' and Peter Jackson's ''The Hobbit'', which is currently in production. He is also set to compose the music to ''Sinatra'', and ''The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt'', both of which are being directed by Martin Scorsese and are due for release in 2011.

Conducting & performing

Since 2004, he has toured the world conducting local orchestras in the performance of his new symphonic arrangement of his highly acclaimed ''Lord of the Rings'' scores. The new work is entitled ''The Lord of the Rings: Symphony in Six Movements''. There are two movements for each of the movies, and an intermission between the second and third (or first and second, in some cases) movements. The concert presentation of the symphony also includes projected still images relating the music being performed to scenes from the films. Recently, however, Shore has been busy with other projects, leaving other conductors including Markus Huber, Alexander Mickelthwaite, and John Mauceri to lead the orchestras. April 24, 2008 marked the North American Live to Projection debut of ''Fellowship of the Ring'', with the score performed live by the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Ludwig Wicki. Wicki also conducted the Filene Center Orchestra at the Wolf Trap Farm Park in Vienna, Virginia on May 21 and 22, 2008 in the U.S. premiere of the Fellowship of the Ring Live to Projection. September 16, 2010 Shore conducted the RSO Vienna (Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra) which performed "In Dreams from The Fellowship of the Ring" at Hollywood in Vienna in Vienna, Austria.

Miscellany

Shore makes a cameo appearance on film in ''The Return of the King'' (extended edition) as a Guard of Rohan, during the drinking game at Edoras.

Shore was played by Neil Portnow in the 1989 film version of Bob Woodward's book ''Wired: The Short Life and Fast Times of John Belushi''.

Shore was commissioned by Macy's to write a Fanfare for the Store's 150th anniversary featuring the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Wanamaker Organ, the world's largest playing pipe organ. The work was debuted in the Grand Court of Macy's Philadelphia Store on September 27, 2008 in a concert that drew reviews from most of the major East Coast newspapers.

Included in the soundtrack to the film ''The Departed'', was a version of the song "Comfortably Numb", written in part by Roger Waters. Shore later collaborated with Waters on the song "Hello, I Love You" for the soundtrack of the film "The Last Mimzy".

With John Lurie, Shore wrote the theme song for ''Late Night with Conan O'Brien''. The theme was carried over to ''The Tonight Show'' when O'Brien succeeded Jay Leno as host.

Shore's work is notable for including the scores for two out of only three sequel films that won the Academy Award for Best Picture. The first was ''The Silence of the Lambs'' (sequel to the 1986 film ''Manhunter''), and the second, ''The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King''. The only other sequel film to achieve this is ''The Godfather Part II''. Shore narrates a one-hour CBC Radio documentary/soundscape on music in thriller/suspense film genres also including references to radio dramas and other media. The episode was called "Unsettling Scores" and premiered on the program called Inside the Music.

Awards

Shore has received three Academy Award nominations, winning all of them, two for Best Original Music Score, for ''The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring'' (2001), and ''The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King'' (2003). He also won the Oscar for Best Original Song for "Into the West" from ''Return of the King''.

Shore has also received four Golden Globe nominations, winning two consecutive awards for ''The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King'' (2003) and ''The Aviator'' (2004), making him the only the second composer (after Alan Menken) to have received consecutive Golden Globe Awards for Best Original Score. He also won three consecutive Grammy Awards for Best Score for each of the Lord of the Rings films, and received a second award in 2003 for the song "Into the West" from "Return of the King" in the category of Best Song. He has also received five BAFTA nominations, but has not won.

On June 11, 2007, Shore was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Letters Degree from York University in Toronto for "his sweeping artistic vision".

Shore has also been honored with awards from The National Board of Review, Recording Academy Honors, The Broadcast Film Critics, Chicago Film Critics, Genie Award, World Soundtrack Award, New York's Gotham Award, and The Saturn Award for Science Fiction.

Shore is the first recipient of the Film & TV Music Award for Best Score for a Science Fiction Feature Film for ''The Last Mimzy''.

One September 16, 2010 he was awarded with the Max Steiner Film Music Achievement Award by the City of Vienna at the yearly film music gala concert Hollywood in Vienna.

Filmography

''The Brood'' (1979)

''Scanners'' (1981)

''Videodrome'' (1983)

''After Hours'' (1985)

''The Fly'' (1986)

''Big'' (1988)

''Dead Ringers'' (1988)

''Naked Lunch'' (1991)

''The Silence of the Lambs'' (1991)

''The Last of the Mohicans'' (1992)

''Mrs. Doubtfire'' (1993)

''Philadelphia'' (1993)

''M. Butterfly'' (1993)

''The Client'' (1994)

''Ed Wood'' (Grammy Nominee) (1994)

''Nobody's Fool'' (1994)

''Moonlight and Valentino'' (1995)

''Se7en'' (1995)

''Crash'' (1996)

''The Truth About Cats & Dogs'' (1996)

''That Thing You Do!'' (1996)

''Striptease'' (1996)

''The Game'' (1997)

''Cop Land'' (1997)

''eXistenZ'' (1999)

''Analyze This'' (1999)

''Dogma'' (1999)

''High Fidelity'' (2000)

''The Cell'' (2000)

''The Yards'' (2000)

''The Score'' (2001)

''The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring'' (Oscar Winner, Grammy Winner & Golden Globe Nominee) (2001)

''Gangs of New York'' (2002)

''Panic Room'' (2002)

''Spider'' (2002)

''The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers'' (Grammy Winner) (2002)

''The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King'' (2 Oscars Winner, 2 Golden Globes Winner & 2 Grammys Winner) (2003)

''The Aviator'' (Golden Globe Winner & Grammy Nominee) (2004)

''A History of Violence'' (2005)

''The Departed'' (Grammy Nominee) (2006)

''Soul of the Ultimate Nation'' (MMORPG) (2007)

''The Last Mimzy'' (2007)

''Eastern Promises'' (Golden Globe Nominee) (2007)

''Doubt'' (2008)

''The Betrayal'' (2008)

''The Twilight Saga: Eclipse'' (2010)

''Edge of Darkness'' (2010)

''A Dangerous Method'' (2011)

''Hugo Cabret'' (2011)

''The Spider'' (2011) ''Sinatra'' (2011) ''The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt'' (2011) ''The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey'' (2012)

''Cosmopolis'' (2012)

''The Hobbit: There And Back Again'' (2013)

See also

List of noted film producer and composer collaborations

References

External links

Howard Shore at Soundtrackguide.net

Howard Shore at The Danish Filmmusic Society (DFS)

Howard Shore Interview at Tracksounds

Category:1946 births Category:People from Toronto Category:Berklee College of Music alumni Category:Best Original Music Score Academy Award winners Category:Best Song Academy Award winning songwriters Category:Canadian film score composers Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Living people Category:Saturday Night Live Band members

ar:هوارد شور br:Howard Shore bg:Хауърд Шор ca:Howard Shore da:Howard Shore de:Howard Shore et:Howard Shore es:Howard Shore fr:Howard Shore it:Howard Shore ka:ჰოვარდ შორი hu:Howard Shore nl:Howard Shore ja:ハワード・ショア no:Howard Shore nn:Howard Shore pl:Howard Shore pt:Howard Shore ru:Шор, Говард sk:Howard Shore sl:Howard Shore fi:Howard Shore sv:Howard Shore tr:Howard Shore uk:Говард Шор zh:霍华德·肖