Saxophonists · b. 1953
John Zorn
American composer, saxophonist and bandleader
- Born
- 2 September 1953
New York City - Country
- United States
- Active
- 1973–
- Record labels
- Elektra, Tzadik Records
- Discography
- 260 albums
Biography
John Zorn is a jazz musician who plays saxophone and alto saxophone. John Zorn was born on 2 September 1953 in New York City. The music is usually filed under avant-garde jazz. Record labels: Elektra and Tzadik Records. The discography here lists 260 albums, from “Lacrosse” (1977) to “The Bagatelles, Vol. 8” (2026). Honours include MacArthur Fellows Program (2006).
John Zorn (born September 2, 1953) is an American composer, conductor, producer, arranger and saxophonist who "deliberately resists category". Zorn's avant-garde compositions and experimental improvisations meld jazz, rock, hardcore, classical, contemporary, surf, metal, soundtrack, ambient, Jewish and world music performed by "often unexpected groups of players.. getting startling, unrepeatable results". Rolling Stone noted that "[alt]hough Zorn has operated almost entirely outside the mainstream, he's gradually asserted himself as one of the most influential musicians of our time". Zorn re-arranged and radically orchestrated Ennio Morricone's spaghetti Western, gangster and war movie themes for The Big Gundown, released on Nonesuch Records in 1986 to critical acclaim. His following albums, Spillane (1987) and Naked City (1990) continued to merge styles and challenge formats.
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Discography
Studio and live albums
Lacrosse
1977 · Live
Hockey
1980
Pool
1980
Archery
1981
Locus Solus
1983
The Classic Guide To Strategy - Volume One
1983
Ganryu Island
1985
Experimental Performance
1986 · Live
The Big Gundown: John Zorn Plays the Music of Ennio Morricone
1986
The Classic Guide to Strategy - Volume Two
1986
Cobra
1987
Spillane
1987
News for Lulu
1988
Spy vs. Spy: The Music of Ornette Coleman
1989
Filmworks I: 1986-1990
1990
Naked City
1990
Elegy
1992
More News for Lulu
1992
高橋悠治リアルタイム2 ゾーン・三宅・マセダ
1992 · Live
Kristallnacht
1993
The Art of Memory
1994
Filmworks II: Music for an Untitled Film by Walter Hill
1995
Filmworks III: 1990–1995
1995
First Recordings 1973
1995
John Zorn's Cobra: Live at the Knitting Factory
1995 · Live
John Zorn's Cobra: Tokyo Operations '94
1995
Nani Nani
1995
Redbird
1995
The Book of Heads
1995
Bar Kokhba
1996
Filmworks V: Tears of Ecstasy
1996
Filmworks VI: 1996
1996
Duras:Duchamp
1997
Euclid's Nightmare
1997
Filmworks IV: S/M + More
1997
Filmworks VII: Cynical Hysterie Hour
1997
New Traditions in East Asian Bar Bands
1997
Angelus Novus
1998
Aporias: Requia for Piano & Orchestra
1998
Downtown Lullaby
1998
Filmworks VIII: 1997
1998
Music for Children
1998
The Bribe
1998
The Circle Maker
1998
Taboo and Exile
1999
The String Quartets
1999
Bladerunner! (with Fred Frith, Bill Laswell & Dave Lombardo)
2000
Cartoon S/M
2000
Filmworks IX: Trembling Before G-d
2000
Pool
2000
Xu Feng: John Zorn's Game Pieces, Volume I
2000
2001-10-31: Kenneth Anger Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, New York, NY, USA
2001 · Live
Filmworks X: In The Mirror of Maya Deren
2001
Madness, Love and Mysticism
2001
Songs from the Hermetic Theater
2001
The Gift
2001
Cobra: John Zorn's Game Pieces, Volume 2
2002
Filmworks XI: 2002, Volume One: Secret Lives
2002
Filmworks XII: 2002, Volume Two: Three Documentaries
2002
Filmworks XIII: 2002, Volume Three: Invitation to a Suicide
2002
IAO
2002
Chimeras
2003
Filmworks XIV: Hiding and Seeking
2003
Masada Anniversary Edition, Volume 1: Masada Guitars
2003
50th Birthday Celebration, Volume 5
2004 · Live
50th Birthday Celebration, Volume 9: The Classic Guide to Strategy, Volume 3: The Fire Book
2004 · Live
Magick
2004
Masada Anniversary Edition, Volume 4: Masada Recital
2004
Naninani II
2004
50th Birthday Celebration, Volume 10
2005 · Live
Astaroth: Book of Angels, Volume 1
2005
Azazel: Book of Angels, Volume 2
2005
Filmworks XV: Protocols of Zion
2005
Filmworks XVI: Workingman's Death
2005
Masada Anniversary Edition, Volume 5: Masada Rock
2005
Mysterium
2005
Rituals
2005
The Stone: Issue One
2005
Astronome
2006
Balan: Book of Angels, Volume 5
2006
Filmworks XVII
2006
Filmworks XVIII: The Treatment
2006
Malphas: Book of Angels, Volume 3
2006
Moonchild: Songs Without Words
2006
Orobas: Book of Angels, Volume 4
2006
From Silence to Sorcery
2007
Six Litanies for Heliogabalus
2007
Filmworks XIX: The Rain Horse
2008
Filmworks XX: Sholem Aleichem
2008
Filmworks XXI: Belle de Nature / The New Rijksmuseum
2008
Filmworks XXII: The Last Supper
2008
Lucifer: Book of Angels, Volume 10
2008
The Crucible
2008
The Dreamers
2008
The Stone: Issue Three
2008 · Live
Alhambra Love Songs
2009
Femina
2009
Filmworks XXIII: El General
2009
O’o
2009
Astronome: A Night at the Opera (A Disturbing Initiation)
2010
Baal: Book of Angels, Volume 15
2010
Dictée / Liber Novus
2010
Filmworks XXIV: The Nobel Prizewinner
2010
In Search of the Miraculous
2010
Interzone
2010
Ipos: Book of Angels, Volume 14
2010
Ipsissimus
2010
Late Works
2010
The Goddess: Music for the Ancient of Days
2010
What Thou Wilt
2010
A Dreamers Christmas
2011
At the Gates of Paradise
2011
Enigmata
2011
Nova Express
2011
The Receiving Surfaces
2011 · Live
The Satyr's Play / Cerberus
2011
A Vision in Blakelight
2012
Mount Analogue
2012
Music and Its Double
2012
Nosferatu
2012
Rimbaud
2012
Templars: In Sacred Blood
2012
The Concealed
2012
The Gnostic Preludes: Music of Splendor
2012
The Hermetic Organ: St. Paul’s Chapel, NYC
2012 · Live
Dreamachines
2013
Filmworks XXV: City of Slaughter / Schmatta / Beyond the Infinite
2013
In Lambeth: Visions From the Walled Garden of William Blake
2013
Lemma
2013
On the Torment of Saints, the Casting of Spells and the Evocation of Spirits
2013
Shir Hashirim
2013
The Mysteries
2013
“@”
2013
Fragmentations, Prayers and Interjections
2014
In the Hall of Mirrors
2014
Myth and Mythopoeia
2014
On Leaves of Grass
2014
Psychomagia
2014
The Alchemist
2014
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 2: St. Paul’s Chapel, NYC
2014 · Live
The Last Judgment
2014
The Song Project
2014
The Testament of Solomon: Music From the Sefer Shirim Shel Shir Hashirim
2014
Transmigration of the Magus
2014
Valentine's Day
2014
Hen to Pan
2015
Inferno
2015
James Moore Plays the Book of Heads
2015
New York
2015
Pellucidar: A Dreamers Fantabula
2015
Simulacrum
2015
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 3: St. Paul’s Hall, Huddersfield
2015 · Live
The Song Project: Live at LPR
2015 · Live
The True Discoveries of Witches and Demons
2015
49 Acts of Unspeakable Depravity in the Abominable Life and Times of Gilles de Rais
2016
Commedia dell'arte
2016
Madrigals (For Six Female Voices)
2016
Sacred Visions
2016
The Classic Guide to Strategy, Volume 4
2016
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 4: St. Bart’s, NYC
2016 · Live
The Mockingbird
2016
The Painted Bird
2016
Midsummer Moons
2017
The Garden of Earthly Delights
2017
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 5: Philharmonie de Paris
2017 · Live
The Interpretation of Dreams
2017
There Is No More Firmament
2017
In a Convex Mirror
2018
Insurrection
2018
Salem 1692
2018
The Book Beri'ah
2018
The Urmuz Epigrams
2018
Cat O'Nine Tails / The Dead Man / Memento Mori / Kol Nidre
2019
Encomia
2019
Nove Cantici Per Francesco D'Assisi
2019
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 6: For Edgar Allan Poe
2019 · Live
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 7: St. John the Divine
2019 · Live
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 8: For Antonin Artaud
2019 · Live
The Hierophant
2019
Tractatus Musico-Philosophicus: Philosophical Investigations From the Invisible Theatre
2019
Azoth
2020
Baphomet
2020
Beyond Good And Evil—Simulacrum Live
2020 · Live
Calculus
2020
Les Maudits
2020
The Turner Études
2020
Virtue
2020
A Garden of Forking Paths
2021
Chaos Magick
2021
Gnosis: The Inner Light
2021
Heaven and Earth Magick
2021
John Zorn’s Bagatelles, Vol. 1–4
2021
John Zorn’s Bagatelles, Vol. 5–8
2021
Meditations on the Tarot
2021
New Masada Quartet
2021
Nostradamus: The Death of Satan
2021
Parables
2021
Shinjuku Pit Inn
2021 · Live
Teresa de Ávila
2021
The Ninth Circle
2021
Incerto
2022
John Zorn’s Bagatelles, Vol. 9–12
2022
John Zorn’s Olympiad - vol. 2 Fencing 1978
2022 · Live
Multiplicities: A Repository of Non‐Existent Objects
2022
Perchance to Dream…
2022
Song of Songs
2022
Spinoza
2022
Suite for Piano
2022
The Cleansing
2022
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 10: Bozar, Brussels
2022 · Live
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 9: Liber VII
2022 · Live
2023-04-02: Tennessee Theatre, Big Ears Festival, Knoxville, TN, USA
2023 · Live
2023-09-03: Cobra, John Zorn at 70 SF, Great American Music Hall, San Francisco, CA, USA
2023 · Live
444
2023
Full Fathom Five
2023
Homenaje a Remedios Varo
2023
John Zorn’s Bagatelles, Vol. 13–16
2023
Memoria
2023
Multiplicities II: A Repository of Nonexistent Objects
2023
New Masada Quartet, Vol. 2
2023
Nothing Is as Real as Nothing
2023
Parrhesiastes
2023
Quatrain
2023
The Fourth Way
2023
Ballades
2024
Hannigan Sings Zorn Volume One
2024 · Live
Hannigan Sings Zorn, Volume Two
2024 · Live
Her Melodious Lay
2024
Lamentations
2024
Love Songs Live
2024 · Live
New Masada Quartet, Vol. 3
2024 · Live
Ou Phrontis
2024
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 11: For Terry Riley
2024
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 12: The Bosch Requiem
2024
The Hermetic Organ, Vol. 13: Biennale Musica Venezia
2024 · Live
Tokyo Rotation 1 - Day 5 Set 1
2024 · Live
Tokyo Rotation 1 - Day 5 Set 2
2024 · Live
Fantasma
2025
Impromptus
2025
John Zorn's Bagatelles Vol. 4
2025
Memories, Dreams, and Reflections
2025
Nocturnes
2025
Prolegomena
2025
The Bagatelles, Vol. 1
2025
The Bagatelles, Vol. 2
2025
The Bagatelles, Vol. 3 - Trigger
2025
The Complete String Quartets
2025
Through the Looking Glass
2025
Alea iacta est
2026
Flatlands
2026 · Tzadik
John Zorn’s Olympiad Vol. 4 – Curling
2026
Seven Sonnets
2026
Sing Me Now Asleep
2026
The Bagatelles Vol. 5
2026
The Bagatelles Vol. 6
2026
The Bagatelles, Vol. 7
2026
The Bagatelles, Vol. 8
2026
1998-09-15: Slim's, San Francisco, CA, USA
· Live
2003-06-17: Koninklijk Theater Carré, Amsterdam, Netherlands
· Live
2006-04-07: Cervantes' Masterpiece Ballroom, Denver, CO, USA
· Live
Member of
Awards
Listen on Spotify
Frequently asked questions
What instrument does John Zorn play?
John Zorn is known for playing saxophone and alto saxophone.
When and where was John Zorn born?
John Zorn was born 2 September 1953 in New York City.
What are John Zorn's best-known albums?
Albums in our database include Flatlands (2026), The Bagatelles Vol. 6 (2026), Lacrosse (1977), Hockey (1980) and Pool (1980).
External links
- en.wikipedia.org ↗
- de.wikipedia.org ↗
- it.wikipedia.org ↗
- wikidata.org ↗
- musicbrainz.org ↗
- discogs.com ↗
- allmusic.com ↗
- tzadik.com ↗
Data compiled from open sources; see the source links below. Spotted an error? Let us know.