Jair-Rôhm Parker Wells (born October 13, 1958) is an American free improvising electric bassist. He is one of the founding members of the improvising band Machine Gun with Thomas Chapin and

Robert Musso Robert Musso is a New York City-based guitarist, composer, engineer, and producer. He is the founder of the independent record label MuWorks as well as the record label - MussoMusic.com. Over the course of a 40 - year career, Musso has produced, mix ...

and the founder of the Meeting Interdisciplinary Arts Festival in Stockholm, Sweden. He lived in

Stockholm Stockholm (; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, most populous city of Sweden, as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in the Nordic countries. Approximately ...

, Sweden, from 1985 until 2017. He has been a promoter of improvised and

experimental music Experimental music is a general label for any music or music genre that pushes existing boundaries and genre definitions. Experimental compositional practice is defined broadly by exploratory sensibilities radically opposed to, and questioning of, ...

and has collaborated with Bob Belden,

Karl Berger Karl Hans Berger (March 30, 1935 – April 9, 2023) was a German-American jazz pianist, vibraphonist, composer, and educator. He was a leading figure in jazz improvisation from the 1960s when he settled in the United States for life. He founde ...

, Daniel Carter,

Jaron Lanier Jaron Zepel Lanier (, born May 3, 1960) is an American computer scientist, visual artist, computer philosophy writer, technologist, futurist, and composer of contemporary classical music. Considered a founder of the field of virtual reality, La ...

, John Sinclair, Shabaka Hutchings, and

Tony Scott Anthony David Leighton Scott (21 June 1944 – 19 August 2012) was a British film director and producer. He made his theatrical film debut with ''The Hunger (1983 film), The Hunger'' (1983) and went on to direct highly successful action and t ...

. In 2017, he was in residence at

EMS Ems or EMS may refer to: Places and rivers * Domat/Ems, a Swiss municipality in the canton of Grisons * Ems (river) (Eems), a river in northwestern Germany and northeastern Netherlands that discharges in the Dollart Bay * Ems (Eder), a river o ...

in Stockholm where he began work on his opera ''#blacbuc''. The work was composed on the Buchla 100 and 200e systems at the institute. Compositions from his ''Liberation'' cycle are featured as part of res·o·nant, the light and sound installation by artist Mischa Kuball at the

Jewish Museum Berlin The Jewish Museum Berlin (''Jüdisches Museum Berlin'') was opened in 2001 and is the largest Jewish museum in Europe. On of floor space, the museum presents the history of the Jews in Germany from the Middle Ages to the present day, with new foc ...

. Raised in southern Germany, Jair-Rohm moved to New York in 1978. After touring the United States for a year with a pop music band, he attended

Tulane University The Tulane University of Louisiana (commonly referred to as Tulane University) is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by a cohort of medical doctors, it b ...

in New Orleans. At Tulane he performed with local jazz and rhythm and blues musicians. He also performed as a member of Tulane University's Tulanians, met and studied with Richard Payne, and discovered the music of

Harry Partch Harry Partch (June 24, 1901 – September 3, 1974) was an American composer, music theorist, and creator of unique musical instruments. He composed using scales of unequal intervals in just intonation, and was one of the first 20th-century com ...

. In 1980 he returned to New York and started work-study with saxophonist Ken Simon. He met

Anthony Braxton Anthony Braxton (born June 4, 1945) is an American experimental composer, educator, music theorist, improviser and multi-instrumentalist who is best known for playing saxophones, particularly the alto. Braxton grew up on the South Side of Chi ...

and studied his music. In 1982 he founded his experimental music theater group Glass Thought Theater Ensemble. Between 1982 and 1983 he was composer in residence at the New York Theater Ensemble, writing and producing a trilogy of progressive "operas". He received a Meet the Composer grant in 1983. During the next year, he lived in New Jersey and was a founding member of the New Brunswick Jazz Musician's Collective, for which he composed several works for ensembles. He has performed at Vahdat Hall (Tehran, Iran),

Xinghai Conservatory of Music The Xinghai Conservatory of Music, also known as the Xinghai Conservatory, is a music conservatory in Guangzhou City, Guangdong Province, China. It has two campuses: one in the Guangzhou Higher Education Mega Center in Panyu District, another ...

(Guangzhou, China), Tribeca Performing Arts Center (New York), Globen Arena (Stockholm), Saxophone Jazz Pub (Bangkok, Thailand), Cafe Oto (London, England) and the Domicil Jazz Club (Munich, Germany).

Partial discography

* ''Soul Home'' (GTC) * ''Sympathy for the Donkey'' with 3 Banditos (Klanggold) * ''AMDG'' (Klanggold) * ''Exquisite Noise'' (GTC) * ''Inside of Outside'' with Cyndi Dawson (

CD Baby CD Baby, Inc. is a Portland, Oregon based online distributor of independent music. The company was described as an "anti-label" by its parent company's Chief Operating Officer Tracy Maddux. It was established in 1998 and offered distribution fo ...

) * ''Steamroom Variations'' with Decision Dream (Red Toucan) * ''Meditations on Albert Ayler'' with the Jair-Rohm Parker Wells Trio ( Ayler) * ''Machine Gun'' with Machine Gun (Musso) * ''Active Resonance'' with

(Musso) * ''Open Fire'' with Machine Gun (Musso) * ''Pass the Ammo'' with Machine Gun (Musso) * ''Personal Nuclear Device'' with

Reeves Gabrels Reeves Gabrels (born June 4, 1956) is an American guitarist, songwriter and producer. A member of The Cure since 2012, Gabrels is also known for his work with David Bowie and Tin Machine from 1988 to 1999. He also fronts the band Reeves Gabrels ...

and Lance Carter (musician) as Doom Dogs (Musso) * ''The Prostitution of Meritocracy'' (ZH27) * ''Brotherly Love in Philadelphia'' with the Jair-Rohm Parker Wells Trio ( Ayler)

External links and references

*Official website
Bass , Jair-Rohm Parker WellsDecision Dream ''Steamroom Variations''"Take Five With Jair-Rohm Parker Wells"
Specific {{DEFAULTSORT:Wells, Jair-Rohm Parker 1958 births 20th-century American bass guitarists American avant-garde musicians American jazz bass guitarists American male bass guitarists American jazz composers American jazz double-bassists American male double-bassists Avant-garde double-bassists Avant-garde jazz musicians Free funk musicians Free improvising musicians Free jazz double-bassists Living people American male jazz composers 21st-century American double-bassists 20th-century American male musicians 21st-century American male musicians Machine Gun (band) members Soul Enterprise members