Fred Ho

Fred Ho (actually, Fred Wei -han Houn, pinyin: Hou weihan, born August 10, 1957 in Palo Alto, California) is an American jazz composer, bandleader and baritone saxophonist of modern jazz as well as writer and political activist.

Life and work

Fred Ho has Chinese roots, studied at Harvard University and is in the Asian-American jazz spectrum and worked in his music combined jazz with elements of Asian music. Already in his first album " Tomorrow Is Now" takes Ho relation in models such as Ornette Coleman ( " Tomorrow Is the Question " ) and Max Roach ( " Freedom Suite "). With his Afro-Asian Ensemble, which he founded in 1982, connects Ho - similarly as did Charlie Haden and his Liberation Music Orchestra - especially in his third album, The Underground Railway to the Heart political concerns with the lyricism of jazz; he thereby strongly oriented to the sound of Charles Mingus and Duke Ellington's baritone saxophonist Harry Carney and the like with the title "Caravan" by Juan Tizol. Ho also worked in big band projects by Julius Hemphill. His partner in the Afro-Asian ensemble include Kiyoto Fujiwara and Jon Jang. Ho also wrote music plays such as Deadly She- Wolf Assassin at Armageddon, which in June 2006 in Philadelphia had its premiere, as well as Voice of the Dragon I, II, and III.

Ho is also active as a political activist and writer; He is co-editor of two books, Legacy to Liberation: Politics and Culture of Revolutionary Asian Pacific America and Sounding Off! Music as Subversion / Resistance / Revolution. Hos variety of activities take place in the context of the Asian-American movement. Ho has been involved as a student at Harvard in the founding of many civil rights groups like the East Coast Asian Students Union, the Asian American Arts Alliance in New York City, the Asian American Resource Center in Boston and the record label Asian Improv.

Ho lives in Greenpoint, a neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York.

Auswahldiskographie

  • Monkey 1, 2, 3
  • Tomorrow Is Now ( Soul Note, 1985)
  • We Rufuse to be Used and Abused ( Soul Note, 1987)
  • The Underground Railway to the Heart ( Soul Note, 1990-1993)
  • Monkey Part I (Koch Jazz, 1996)
  • Once Upon a Time in Chinese America ... ( Innova, 1999)
  • Fred Ho's Green Monster Big Band: Year of the Tiger ( Innova, 2011) with Bobby Zankel, Salim Washington, Stanton Davis, Taylor Ho Bynum, Mary Halvorson

Lexical entry

  • Richard Cook & Brian Morton: The Penguin Guide To Jazz on CD, 6th Edition, London, Penguin, 2002 ISBN 0-14-017949-6.
Baritone saxophone Richard Cook (journalist) Brian Morton (Scottish writer) Integrated Authority File
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