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A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music

A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music
By George E. Lewis

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Founded in 1965 and still active today, the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) is an American institution with an international reputation. From its working-class roots on the South Side of Chicago, the AACM went on to forge an extensive legacy of cultural and social experimentation, crossing both musical and racial boundaries. The success of individual members and ensembles such as Muhal Richard Abrams, the Art Ensemble of Chicago, and Anthony Braxton has been matched by the enormous influence of the collective itself in inspiring a generation of musical experimentalists. George E. Lewis, who joined the collective as a teenager in 1971, establishes the full importance and vitality of the AACM with this communal history, written with a symphonic sweep that draws on a cross-generational chorus of voices and a rich collection of rare images.

Faced with shrinking economic opportunities in Chicago and a segregated music industry, the original members of the AACM found inspiration in the civil rights movement’s call for change through self-determination and collective action. These musicians pooled their individual strengths in a new organization powerfully committed to a forward-thinking approach to musical creation and performance. Evolving a range of experimental methods, from invented instruments and unusual musical scores to improvisation and the early use of computers, the AACM challenged the borders separating classical music and jazz.

Moving from Chicago to New York to Paris, and from founding member Steve McCall’s kitchen table to Carnegie Hall, A Power Stronger Than Itself uncovers a vibrant, multicultural universe and brings to light a major piece of the history of avant-garde music and art.
(20071211)

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #41675 in Books
  • Published on: 2008-05-15
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Hardcover
  • 690 pages

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Written with the eye of an ethnographer, the ear of a performer, and the heart of a hometown dweller, George Lewis's account of the development of the AACM is an engaging story, a romance in which several generations of musicians triumph to create a music that travels around the world, yet is completely unique to their experiences. Reinscribing Chicago as a city of enormous artistic vitality and tough aesthetics, A Power Stronger Than Itself brilliantly redraws the map of jazz and widens the horizon for new and experimental music." - John Szwed, author of Space Is the Place: The Lives and Times of Sun Ra"

Review
"George Lewis has outdone himself with this extraordinary volume. His unrelenting intelligence and ear for detail have produced a challenging compendium of late twentieth-century African Americana. This is not only a study of the AACM, it is a hope-drenched encomium to modernist creativity and the oppositional imagination."-Paul Gilroy, author of Postcolonial Melancholia and The Black Atlantic (Paul Gilroy 20080410)

"The AACM is one of our great cultural inventions. This extraordinary book embodies its principles, for George Lewis draws on multiple traditions: scholarship, reportage, testament, analysis, theory and criticism come together with virtuosity and scrupulous discipline. A Power Stronger Than Itself remaps the landscape of American experimental music. Academics, critics and musicians will have to reconfigure such terms as `jazz,' `classical,' `soulful,' `avant-garde,' `black' and `white.' Now the past yields unexpected wonders; the future unexpected possibilities."-Margo Jefferson, author of On Michael Jackson (Margo Jefferson 20080413)

"A remarkable book, not just for corralling an enormous amount of information-interviews, critical reviews, music charts, news reports (the bibliography runs 35 pages)-but for making the result a digestible and thoroughly entertaining 500-page read."-Time Out Chicago (Time Out Chicago 20080410)

"With A Power Stronger Than Itself, Lewis exceeds expectations. For rather than merely recount the ascent of the AACM, he elegantly sets it against the backdrop of cultural, racial and social changes that shook the twentieth century. . . . Lewis unreels this tale with dramatic flourish and scholarly authority, in effect telling the story of not only the AACM but also the city where it's centered, Chicago."-Howard Reich, Chicago Tribune (Howard Reich Chicago Tribune 20070320)

"Lewis's landmark book. . . goes deeper into the formation and development of the AACM than any previous history, and as a formal acknowledgement of the group's enormous importance and influence it's long overdue."-Peter Margasak, Chicago Reader (Peter Margasak Chicago Reader )

"This could very well be the most anticipiated book of the year. . . . The long wait is now over and patrience will be rewarded. George Lewis''s encyclopedic knowledge, thorough research and in-depth interviews have produced an eye-opening work. . . . Overall, it is a pleasant read, scholarly but not overly academic in tone, covering a wide stylistic range--from essay to storytelling to autobiography." (Alain Drouot Jazz Notes )

"[Lewis] sets a new standard for scholarly writing about the people who make Great Black Music, or any other kind.. . . . Reading Lewis'' book about the AACM makes one want to have been a part ofit." (Downbeat )

"Written with the eye of an ethnographer, the ear of a performer, and the heart of a hometown dweller, George Lewis's account of the development of the AACM is an engaging story, a romance in which several generations of musicians triumph to create a music that travels around the world, yet is completely unique to their experiences. Reinscribing Chicago as a city of enormous artistic vitality and tough aesthetics, A Power Stronger Than Itself brilliantly redraws the map of jazz and widens the horizon for new and experimental music."-John Szwed, author of Space Is the Place: The Lives and Times of Sun Ra (John Szwed )

About the Author
George E. Lewis is the Edwin H. Case Professor of American Music at Columbia University. A recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship in 2002, Lewis has made over 120 recordings as composer or performer.

Customer Reviews

Its a good read !4
George E Lewis has written a very readable account of this organisation and its history. Its a long story 40+ years, many contributions, Includes biographies of key figures, and social history. a few more musical examples or analysis of actual works could have made it even better. Overall recommended to anyone into AACM or any fan of progressive jazz.

The avant-garde jazz compendium5
George E. Lewis has written a superlative history of avant-garde jazz and The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians. I am truly amazed with his research, depth of understanding and what he is teaching me. I get the value of being one of his students just by reading and learning from his authoritative text. George E. Lewis is the subject matter authority on jazz.

I have long wanted to study jazz with a historical timeline view. George E. Lewis helps me achieves this goal admirably.

George thank you for the book my jazz soul has been yearning to know for decades.

Live Your Light,
Ed Jennings

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