Karen Borca

Karen Borca (born September 5, 1948, Green Bay, Wisconsin, United States) is an American avant-garde jazz & free jazz bassoonist.

Borca studied music at the University of Wisconsin with John Barrows and Arthur Weisberg, graduating in 1971. While there she met Cecil Taylor, who taught there during the 1970/71 academic year; she studied with him and played in his big bands, ensembles and the Cecil Taylor Unit, and was his assistant at Antioch College, Ohio, in the Black Music Program. She was an assistant to saxophonist Jimmy Lyons in 1974 during his artist in residence at Bennington College, Vermont and married the longtime Taylor sideman; she played in Lyons's band for 12 years until he died in 1986. She performed with her own bands at the Newport Jazz Festival New York City Salute to Women in Jazz, '78 & '79, Soundscape, Vision Festival, Jazz Fest Berlin and other festivals, concerts, clubs and lofts.

She has continued performing with her own bands in the Lower East Side of New York City, the United States and Europe, and with musicians such as Cecil Taylor, William Parker, Bill Dixon, Butch Morris, Marco Eneidi, Joel Futterman, Sonny Simmons, Alan Silva, and Jackson Krall.

Discography

With Bill Dixon

• 17 Musicians in Search of a Sound: Darfur (Aum Fidelity, 2007)

With Earth People

• Waking the Living (Undivided Vision, 2001)

With Marco Eneidi

• Final Disconnect Notice (Botticelli, 1993)

With Joel Futterman

• Passage (Ear-Rational, 1984)

With Jimmy Lyons

• Riffs (Hat Hut, 1980)
• Wee Sneezawee (Black Saint, 1983)
• The Box Set (Ayler, 1984, 1985)
• Give It Up (Black Saint, 1985)

With Joe Morris

• Many Rings (Knitting Factory, 1999)

With Paul Murphy

• Red Snapper (Cadence Jazz, 1982)

With Alan Silva

• Alan Silva & The Sound Visions Orchestra (Eremite, 1999)
• H.Con.Res.57 (Eremite, 2001)

With Sonny Simmons

• The Cosmosamatics (Boxholder, 2001)

With Cecil Taylor

• Winged Serpent (Sliding Quadrants) (Soul Note, 1985)

References

• Karen Borca at Allmusic