The Jazz Composer's Orchestra was an American jazz group, founded by Carla Bley and Michael Mantler in 1965, to perform orchestral avant-garde jazz. [1]
Its origins lay in the Jazz Composers Guild, an organization founded by Bill Dixon which grew out of the series of 1964 concerts in New York, known as the " October Revolution in Jazz" and subsequent regular performance settings. [1] A big band, formed by Bley and Mantler, became known as the Jazz Composers Guild Orchestra, which made its first record in April 1965. [1] After the demise of the Guild, the big band continued as the Jazz Composer's Orchestra. A non-profit organisation was established in 1966, the Jazz Composers Orchestra Association Inc. (JCOA). [1]
The Orchestra's first release was Communication in 1965. Their 1968 double-album The Jazz Composer's Orchestra featured soloists Cecil Taylor, Don Cherry, Roswell Rudd, Pharoah Sanders, Larry Coryell, and Gato Barbieri. [2]
JCOA Records was founded for releases from the Orchestra and its members.
The albums included commissioned works by Roswell Rudd, Clifford Thornton, Don Cherry, Leroy Jenkins and Grachan Moncur III. [1] The group's last performance was in 1975. [3] The activities of the group led to the creation of a record distribution company known as New Music Distribution Service (NMDS).