Lisle Ellis, (born November 17, 1951) is a Canadian jazz bassist and composer who is known for his improvisational style and use of electronics.

Biography

Ellis was born in Campbell River, British Columbia. Ellis began playing

electric bass The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck The ...

in his teens and worked professionally from an early age in numerous environments including studios, radio & TV shows, and strip clubs. He was born Lyle Steve Lansall, but used his initials L. S. as his stage name Ellis; he also used the name L. S. Lansall-Ellis professionally. Ellis studied at the

Vancouver Academy of Music The Vancouver Academy of Music (VAM) is a Canadian music conservatory located in Vancouver, British Columbia. The school was founded as the Community Music School of Greater Vancouver in 1969 through efforts made by the Vancouver Community Arts C ...

with Walter Robertson and attended

Douglas College Douglas College is the largest public degree-granting college institution in British Columbia, Canada. Close to 17,000 credit students, 8,500 continuing education students and 4,210 international students are enrolled here. Douglas College o ...

in Vancouver. He later studied at the

Creative Music Studio The Creative Music Studio (CMS) was a premier study center for contemporary creative music during the 1970s and 1980s, based in Woodstock, New York. Founded in 1971 by Karl Berger, Ingrid Sertso, and Ornette Coleman, it brought together leading i ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

from 1975-1979. Ellis lived in Toronto, Ontario, Canada from 1982 until 1983 and then

Montreal, Quebec Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-pea ...

, Canada from 1983 until 1992. In 1986 Ellis was the first recipient of Canada's Fred Stone Award, given annually to a musician for integrity and innovation. In the early 1980s in Vancouver, and the late 80's in Montreal, Ellis was a conspicuous activator of musician alliance organizations, performance venues, and concert series presentations. One collective in particular, Vancouver's New Orchestra Workshop, is still active nearly thirty years later. After moving to the United States in 1992, he settled in San Francisco, working with

Glenn Spearman Glenn Spearman (February 14, 1947 – October 8, 1998) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. He was associated with free jazz and experimental music. Spearman was active in Oakland, California, in the late 1960s but moved to Paris in 1972 and ...

from 1992 until 2001. He lived in San Diego from 2001–2005 and New York City from 2005 to the present. In 1994, he was a member of the

Cecil Taylor Cecil Percival Taylor (March 25, 1929April 5, 2018) was an American pianist and poet. Taylor was classically trained and was one of the pioneers of free jazz. His music is characterized by an energetic, physical approach, resulting in complex ...

band for a brief tour of California. Ellis's discography includes performances with

Peter Brötzmann Peter Brötzmann (born 6 March 1941) is a German saxophonist and clarinetist. Biography Early life Brötzmann was born in Remscheid, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. He studied painting in Wuppertal and was involved with the Fluxus movement ...

Andrew Cyrille Andrew Charles Cyrille (born November 10, 1939) is an American avant-garde jazz drummer. Throughout his career, he has performed both as a leader and a sideman in the bands of Walt Dickerson and Cecil Taylor, among others. AllMusic biographe ...

Joe McPhee Joe McPhee (born November 3, 1939) is an American jazz multi-instrumentalist born in Miami, Florida, a player of tenor, alto, and soprano saxophone, the trumpet, flugelhorn and valve trombone. McPhee grew up in Poughkeepsie, New York, and is ...

, Dave Douglas, Glenn Spearman and about 40 recordings for

Music & Arts Music & Arts is a classical and jazz record label founded in Berkeley, California by Frederick Maroth. It began in 1984 as a classical music label before adding jazz and world music. The catalog includes classical composers and musicians Milto ...

Black Saint Black Saint and Soul Note are two affiliated Italian independent record labels. Since their conception in the 1970s, they have released albums from a variety of influential jazz musicians, particularly in the genre of free jazz. History Black S ...

, DIW, Hat Art,

New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 3 ...

, and Victo. His 1989 album, ''Kaleidoscopes: The Ornette Coleman Songbook'', with pianist

Paul Plimley Paul Horace Plimley (16 March 1953 – 18 May 2022) was a free jazz pianist and vibraphonist. He was one of the doyens of the Canadian jazz avant-garde, a co-founder of the New Orchestra Workshop Society and frequent collaborator with the bassis ...

, was given five stars in ''

Down Beat ' (styled in all caps) is an American music magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond", the last word indicating its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chi ...

'' magazine. Since the late 1990s, Ellis has been primarily focused on developing an electro-acoustic interface he calls "bass & circuitry". By 2008, with the completion of a template for this interface Ellis turned his attention back to

acoustic music Acoustic music is music that solely or primarily uses instruments that produce sound through acoustic means, as opposed to electric or electronic means. While all music was once acoustic, the retronym "acoustic music" appeared after the adven ...

projects with an emphasis on

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

based improvisation and to finding a balance between his electronic and acoustic music interests. Central to Ellis's music, and a vehicle for both his electronic and acoustic experiments, has been his long standing trio with Larry Ochs and Donald Robinson called What We Live. Di Terra, an Italy-based trio with Alberto Braida (piano), and Fabrizio Spera (drums), has been an exclusively acoustic music vehicle for Ellis. His experimental trio Audible Means with

Ellery Eskelin Ellery Eskelin (born August 16, 1959) is an American tenor saxophonist raised in Baltimore, Maryland and residing in New York City. His parents, Rodd Keith and Bobbie Lee, were both professional musicians. Rodd Keith died in 1974 in Los Angeles, ...

(saxophone), and Erik Deutsch (keyboards), was active on the New York scene in 2006 and 2007 and was a focal point for Ellis's bass & circuitry explorations. Since his arrival in New York, collaborations and interactions with composer/electronic musician Tom Hamilton have also been important to Ellis's work in electronic music.

Discography

* 1995 ''Elevations'' (Victo) * 1998 ''Children in Peril Suite'' (

) * 2008 ''Sucker Punch Requiem'' (Henceforth) With

* 1990 ''Both Sides of the Same Mirror'' (

Nine Winds Nine Winds is an American jazz record label that was founded in 1977 by Vinny Golia. Golia is a self-taught musician who plays over fifty woodwind instruments, in addition to brass. In the early 1970s, he believed it was impossible for musicians ...

) * 1991 ''When Silence Pulls'' (Music & Arts) * 1992 ''Kaleidoscopes'' ( HatArt) * 1992 ''Noir'' (Victo) * 1994 ''Density of the Lovestruck Demons'' (Music & Arts) * 1994 ''Sweet Freedom Now What?'' (HatArt) * 1999 ''Safecrackers'' (Victo) With

* 1994/95 ''Free Worlds'' (

) * 1996 '' The Fields'' (Black Saint) * 1997 ''Let It Go''

Tzadik_ Tzadik_(_he,_צַדִּיק_,_"righteous__ne,_also_''zadik'',_''ṣaddîq''_or_''sadiq'';_pl._''tzadikim''___''ṣadiqim'')_is_a_title_in_Judaism_given_to_people_considered__righteous,_such_as_biblical_figures_and_later_spiritual_masters._The_...

) With_What_We_Live *_1995_''What_We_Live''_(_DIW) *_1996_''What_We_Live_Fo(u)r''_(Black_Saint) *_1999_''Trumpets''_(Black_Saint) *_1999_''Quintet_for_a_Day''_(New_World_ The_term_''New_World''_is_often_used_to_mean_the_majority_of_Earth's_Western_Hemisphere,_specifically_the_Americas."America."_''The_Oxford_Companion_to_the_English_Language''_()._McArthur,_Tom,_ed.,_1992._New_York:_Oxford_University_Press,_p._3_...

Biography

Discography

References

External links