William S. Fischer (born March 5, 1935,

Shelby, Mississippi Shelby is a city in Bolivar County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 2,229 at the 2010 census, down from 2,926 in 2000. The town of Shelby was established in 1853 by Tom Shelby, who had purchased a block of land there from the feder ...

) is an American keyboardist, saxophonist, arranger, and composer. Fischer worked early in his career with blues and R&B musicians, playing in the 1950s with Ray Charles, Guitar Slim,

Big Joe Turner Joseph Vernon "Big Joe" Turner Jr. (May 18, 1911 – November 24, 1985) was an American singer from Kansas City, Missouri. According to songwriter Doc Pomus, "Rock and roll would have never happened without him." His greatest fame was due to ...

, and Muddy Waters. During this period, he received his bachelor's degree from Xavier University in 1956 before taking a master's degree from Colorado College in 1962. After briefly returning to Xavier as an instructor, he continued his education with non-degree coursework (including experimentation with early

synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...

s) at the Vienna Academy of Music and Performance in 1965–66. From 1967 to 1975, he taught in New York public schools. He worked extensively as an arranger and

session musician Session musicians, studio musicians, or backing musicians are musicians hired to perform in recording sessions or live performances. The term sideman is also used in the case of live performances, such as accompanying a recording artist on a ...

for jazz and popular music recordings, working with

Les McCann Leslie Coleman McCann (born September 23, 1935) is an American jazz pianist and vocalist.Feather, Leonard, and Ira Gitler (2007), ''The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz'', p. 448. Oxford University Press. Early life Les McCann was born in ...

and

Joe Zawinul Josef Erich Zawinul ( '; 7 July 1932 – 11 September 2007) was an Austrian jazz and jazz fusion keyboardist and composer. First coming to prominence with saxophonist Cannonball Adderley, Zawinul went on to play with Miles Davis and to bec ...

(having first met the pianist-composer during his European sojourn); in 1968, Zawinul released ''

The Rise and Fall of the Third Stream ''The Rise and Fall of the Third Stream'' is the second studio album by Joe Zawinul, released in 1968. The title refers to the Third stream genre of music, melding classical and jazz. Track listing # "Baptismal" (William Fischer) – 7:37 # "Th ...

'', an album primarily consisting of Fischer compositions. He also arranged for Herbie Mann, who signed him to the

Embryo Records Embryo Records was a jazz and rock record label founded by Herbie Mann as a division of Atlantic Records, itself distributed by the Atlantic subsidiary Cotillion Records Cotillion Records was a subsidiary of Atlantic Records (from 1971 part ...

division of Atlantic. It was for that label that Fischer recorded his 1970 album ''Circles''. Comprising his band were guitarists Hugh McCracken and Eric Weissberg, Ron Carter on electric bass, Billy Cobham on drums/percussion, and Bill Robinson on vocals. Fischer also composed and directed the keyboard elements for the Moog, which were realized at Walter Sear Electronic Music Studio in New York. Throughout the 1970s, he was associated with Yusef Lateef, Roberta Flack,

Gene Ammons Eugene "Jug" Ammons (April 14, 1925 – August 6, 1974), also known as "The Boss", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. The son of boogie-woogie pianist Albert Ammons, Gene Ammons is remembered for his accessible music, steeped in soul and ...

, and Junior Mance among others. In 1972, Fischer issued two solo albums. On his private Arcana label was ''Omen'', a group of multitracked, manually played synth takes at Walter Sear. On the Spanish label Herri Gogoa, Fischer released ''Akelarre Sorta'', a collection of psych-soul treatments of Basque folk idioms. He recorded with Roland Kirk in 1977 and with

Pharoah Sanders Pharoah Sanders (born Ferrell Lee Sanders; October 13, 1940 – September 24, 2022) was an American jazz saxophonist. Known for his overblowing, harmonic, and multiphonic techniques on the saxophone, as well as his use of "sheets of sound", San ...

in 1982."William S. Fischer". '' The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz''. 2nd edition, ed.

Barry Kernfeld Barry Dean Kernfeld (born August 11, 1950) is an American musicologist and jazz saxophonist who has researched and published extensively about the history of jazz and the biographies of its musicians. Education In 1968, Kernfeld enrolled at U ...

, 2004.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fischer, William S. American jazz pianists American male jazz pianists American jazz composers People from Shelby, Mississippi 1935 births Living people Jazz musicians from Mississippi 21st-century American pianists American male jazz composers 21st-century American male musicians