Avram Fefer Music

Avram Fefer
Occupation Musician
Instruments Saxophonist, composer, band leader
Years active 1990-present
Associated acts
Bobby Few
Archie Shepp
The Last Poets
Sunny Murray
Kirk Lightsey
Jack Gregg
Rasul Siddik
Graham Haynes
John Betsch

Avram Fefer is an American jazz saxophonist, composer and band leader, currently residing in New York City. He has been performing and recording internationally since 1990. After spending the decade as a soloist with a number of different groups, his first several recordings as a leader were singled out as among the Best of 2001 and Best of 2002 in publications such as Down Beat, Cadence, the Village Voice, the Chicago Weekly Standard, and JazzPortugal. He has four releases with the jazz pianist Bobby Few, and has performed in most of the major clubs in New York, as well as numerous clubs and festivals in Europe, Africa, Japan, and the Middle East. His trio recording, Eliyahu, featuring Eric Revis on bass and Chad Taylor on drums, was released on Not Two Records [1] in 2011.

Avram grew up on both coasts of the United States, received a liberal arts degree at Harvard University and studied music at Berklee College of Music and New England Conservatory. He spent several years in Paris, where he played with Archie Shepp, The Last Poets, Sunny Murray, Kirk Lightsey, Jack Gregg, Rasul Siddik, Graham Haynes, and John Betsch. It was also in Paris that Avram first became interested in West African and Arabic music, playing with a variety of musicians from Senegal, Cameroon, Mali, and Morocco. He was also a composer and soloist for an “acid” jazz group in France with two top-selling discs on Virgin records (1994–95).

In New York, Fefer continues to compose music and lead numerous groups of his own, releasing ten CDs as a leader and appearing on numerous others as a sideman. He has also been featured in the David Murray Big Band, Butch Morris Orchestra, Joseph Bowie Big Band, Mingus Big Band, Frank Lacy's Vibe Tribe, the Rob Reddy Octet, Famoro Diabate’s Kakande, the Adam Lane Octet, the Michael Bisio Quartet, Adam Rudolph's Organic Orchestra, and Greg Tate's Burnt Sugar. He has a private music teaching practice in downtown Manhattan and collaborates with a variety of creative artists of different genres, including with famed director Melvin Van Peebles on his 2010 theatrical production of Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, in which Avram acted, as well as played tenor sax.

In 2012, he initiated the Resonant Sculpture Project, a series of solo musical interactions with large-scale sculptures --- in particular, the work of Richard Serra. It is a long-term international project that presented at the Gagosian Gallery in New York (2014) and will present at the Princeton Art Museum in Spring 2015.

Discography
1994 - Scatterap/Home, The Last Poets
1994 - Other Worlds, Art Sound Orchestra
1994 - Omnibus, Beigels Daisy Toasts
1995 - Song of the Forest Boogeraboo, Steve McCraven with Archie Shepp
1995 - Eat that Beigel, Beigels Daisy Toasts
1998 - The Soul of Grace, Manhattan New Music Project
2001 - Calling All Spirits, Avram Fefer Trio (with Igal Foni, Eric Revis)
2002 - Few and Far Between, Avram Fefer Trio (with Wilber Morris, Bobby Few)
2002 - Lucille's Gemini Dream, Avram Fefer Quartet (with Steve Swell, Wilber Morris, Igal Foni)
2004 - Shades of the Muse, Avram Fefer Quartet (with Tomas Ulrich, Ken Filiano, Jay Rosen)
2005 - Kindred Spirits, Avram Fefer/Bobby Few Duo
2005 - Heavenly Places, Avram Fefer/Bobby Few Duo
2005 - Painting Breath, Stoking Fire, Avram Fefer/Michael Bisio Duo
2006 - Sanctuary, Avram Fefer/Bobby Few Quartet
2006 - Connections, Michael Bisio Quartet
2007 - More Than Post Human, Burnt Sugar
2007 - Circle This, Michael Bisio Quartet
2008 - Live at the Vision Fest XII, Michael Bisio Quartet
2009 - AM, Michael Bisio Quartet
2009 - Making Love to the Dark Ages, Burnt Sugar
2009 - Ritual, Avram Fefer Trio (with Chad Taylor, Eric Revis)
2010 - Ashcan Rantings, Adam Lane's Full Throttle Orchestra
2011 - Eliyahu, Avram Fefer Trio (with Chad Taylor, Eric Revis)
2011 - CIMPfest: Live in Villach, Austria, Avram Fefer Quartet (with Michael Bisio, Ken Filiano, Jay Rosen)
2011 - Flarf Orchestra, Drew Gardner
2011 - All You Need Is That Negrocity, Burnt Sugar
2012 - The Sound of a Dream, Adam Rudolph's Go: Organic Orchestra
2013 - Blue Spirit Band, Adam Lane, Vijay Anderson, Roy Campbell
2013 - Oh Freedom!, Blue Spirit Band
2013 - Sonic Mandela, Adam Rudolph's Go: Organic Orchestra
2014 - Live in Slovenia, Adam Lane's Full Throttle Orchestra