The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians

Since their founding by a group of forward-thinking jazz musicians that included pianist/composer Muhal Richard Abrams, pianist Jodie Christian, drummer Steve Mccall, and composer Phil Cohran, the AACM have been a force for innovation within the jazz community. The Chicago-based organization is a registered nonprofit organization dedicated, according to the AACM statement, "to nurturing, performing, and recording serious, original music." In the '60s and especially the '70s, the AACM were widely acknowledged as being in the forefront of experimental jazz. Early AACM members such as Abrams, Henry Threadgill, Anthony Braxton, Jack Dejohnette, and the members of The Art Ensemble Of Chicago (Lester Bowie, Roscoe Mitchell, Joseph Jarman, Famadou Don Moye, and Malachi Favors) created music that would have creative implications that reached far beyond the city of Chicago. Their motto is "Great Black Music, Ancient to the Future." Although there is not one typical AACM artist, it can be said that their membership in general has attempted to transcend common practice by absorbing into their work various influences lying outside the jazz domain (African indigenous musics and European classical forms, for example).

Read More