David Werner Amram III (born November 17, 1930) is an American composer, arranger, and conductor of orchestral, chamber, and choral works whose compositions and activities have crossed fearlessly back and forth between the classical and jazz worlds, as well as those of Latin jazz, folk, television, and film music. In addition to his specialty, the French horn, Amram has also recorded on piano, recorder, Spanish guitar, and various percussion instruments.
Born in Feasterville, Philadelphia, Amram spent a year at the Oberlin College Conservatory (1948) but graduated from George Washington University with a B.A. in history in 1952. His long association with Latin music began in 1951 in D.C. when he played horn and percussion in the Buddy Rowell Latin band while also serving as a classical horn player in the National Symphony Orchestra. Stationed with the Seventh Army in Europe, Amram recorded with Lionel Hampton in Paris in 1955, and then returned to New York later that year to join Charles Mingus' Jazz Workshop, performing with Mingus and Oscar Pettiford. In 1957, he created and performed in the first-ever jazz/poetry readings in New York City with novelist Jack Kerouac, a close friend with whom Amram collaborated artistically for over a dozen years.
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| Amran at the 5 Spot in 1957 |
Amram also led a quartet with tenor saxophonist George Barrow that made an album for Decca in 1957 and later played regularly at New York's Five Spot in 1963-1965. However, Amram's career gravitated mostly over to the classical side after the 1950s, producing orchestral and instrumental pieces, incidental music (his score for Archibald MacLeish's J.B. won a Pulitzer prize), and other works which attracted enough respect to have the New York Philharmonic sign him on as its first composer-in-residence (1966-1967). Since the early 1950s, Amram has traveled extensively, working as a musician and a conductor in over 35 countries and criss-crossing the United States and Canada.
His many films include Pull My Daisy (1959), Splendor in The Grass (1960) and The Manchurian Candidate (1962). He composed the scores for Joseph Papp’s Shakespeare in The Park from 1956-1967 and premiered his comic opera 12th Night with Papp’s libretto in 1968. From 1964-66, he was the Composer and Music Director for the Lincoln Center Theatre and wrote the scores for Arthur Miller´s plays After the Fall (1964) and Incident at Vichy (1966).
Here’s “Waltz From "After The Fall" from above 1979 album.
In 1977, Amram sailed on the cruise ship Daphne from New Orleans to Havana with Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Getz, and Earl "Fatha" Hines, who were among the first U.S. citizens to legally visit Cuba in 16 years. An exciting live recording of Amram's "En Memoria de Chano Pozo" was made in Havana with members of Irakere (including Arturo Sandoval and Paquito D'Rivera) and several visiting Americans, which can be heard on the album Havana/New York (Flying Fish). Amram's Cuban visit received extensive news coverage at the time and also provided many Americans with their first glimpse of Irakere.
Most of Amram's available recordings can also be found on Flying Fish. In addition, the open-minded Amram can be heard playing bouncy French horn, recorder, and piano obligatos on some bizarre 1971 tracks by beat poet Allen Ginsberg (sample titles: "Vomit Express" and "Going to San Diego"), later released on John Hammond's eponymous label.
His most popular recent symphonic compositions include This Land, Symphonic Variations On A Song By Woody Guthrie (2007), commissioned by the Guthrie Foundation; Three Songs, A Concerto for Piano and Orchestra (2009); Greenwich Village Portraits for Alto Saxophone and String Orchestra (2018); and Partners: A Double Concerto for Violin, Cello and Orchestra (2018).
He has collaborated as a composer with Elia Kazan, Arthur Miller, Eugene Ormandy, Sir James Galway, Langston Hughes and Jacques D´Amboise, and as a musician with Thelonious Monk, Johnny Depp, Hunter S. Thompson, Dizzy Gillespie, Odetta, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Betty Carter, Floyd Red Crow Westerman, Arlo Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Paquito D´Rivera, Tito Puente and Jerry Jeff Walker.
Amram’s many awards include a number of New York City honours and in 2017 he was made a Lifetime Member of the Actors Studio, received the first annual Lifetime Achievement Award from Folk Music International and a special award by Farm Aid for 30 years of annual musical collaborations with Willie Nelson and his band to help support America´s family farmers through music. Amram, who has written more than 100 orchestral and chamber works and continues to be busy as a musician and lecturer.
(Edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)