The Art Ensemble of Chicago

Originally comprised of saxophonists Roscoe Mitchell and Joseph Jarman, trumpeter Lester Bowie, bassist Malachi Favors, and later, drummer Famoudou Don Moye, the Art Ensemble of Chicago enjoy a critical reputation as the most influential avant-garde jazz ensemble of the 1970s and '80s. During the late '60s and early '70s, the Art Ensemble helped pioneer the fusion of jazz with European art music and indigenous African folk styles. They also combined music from sanctified church services, minstrel shows, and bawdy houses of late 19th and early 20th century America -- with a mod...