Joshua Abrams

Composer, improviser, and multi-instrumentalist Joshua Abrams became a central figure in Chicago’s independent music community after moving from his native Philadelphia in the mid-’90s, an era when he had already served as a founding member of the Roots. Across collaborative ensembles such as Tortoise, Town and Country, Nicole Mitchell’s Black Earth Ensemble, and Chicago Underground, through sideman appearances with David Boykin’s Expanse, Joan of Arc, Bonnie Prince Billy, and Sam Prekop, and while directing his own ensembles Natural Information Society and the Joshua Abrams Quartet, he supplies both rigorous technical command and spontaneous improvisational invention to every setting. Equally comfortable shaping indie rock, modern free jazz, world fusion, or contemporary classical works, he applies a resonant woody bass sound alongside fluid, uncategorizable playing on flutes, strings, percussion, and electronics.

Abrams entered music early, performing in jazz ensembles by the late ’80s and also in Square Roots, the precursor to the live-instrumentation hip-hop collective the Roots. After settling in Chicago in the mid-’90s he rapidly established himself across several local scenes, remaining active in jazz and improv circles, founding the more formally arranged Americana-oriented group Town and Country, and contributing as a studio musician to an extensive roster of recordings. His first album as leader, 2003’s Cipher, featuring Axel Dörner, Guillermo Gregorio, and Jeff Parker, established him as a first-rate improviser more focused on shaping collective energy and momentum than on personal display. He also collaborated with Fred Anderson, at whose Velvet Lounge he worked for years, and with Hamid Drake on From the River to the Ocean.

By the close of the 2000s Abrams had issued multiple recordings under his own name and appeared on dozens more, spanning jazz groups and projects with acclaimed indie artists including Will Oldham, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Joan of Arc, and Edith Frost. His commitments expanded to include film scores and soundtracks as well as leadership of new ensembles for which he served as principal composer. One such project, Joshua Abrams & Natural Information Society, issued several favorably received albums of his material starting in the late 2000s. On the 2014 release Natural Information he explored the Arabic guimbri—an ancient folk instrument whose gourd-like wooden body is covered with animal skin—as a vehicle for composition and organized group improvisation. Recruiting associates from the Chicago improv community such as Drake, Frank Rosaly, Ben Boye, Emmett Kelly, and an evolving roster of additional players, he produced exploratory albums under the NIS name including 2015’s Magnetoception and 2017’s Simultonality, the latter featuring a more stable personnel configuration that benefited from repeated live performances prior to recording.