John Zorn is an American composer, conductor, saxophonist, arranger and producer who "deliberately resists category". His avant-garde and experimental approaches to composition and improvisation are inclusive of jazz, rock, Jewish music, hardcore, classical, contemporary, surf, metal, soundtrack, ambient, and world music. 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 engaged New York City's downtown music scene in the mid-1970s, collaborating with improvising artists and experimenting with compositional strategies and arrangements. Over the next decade he performed throughout Europe and Japan and recorded on independent US and European labels. He released The Big Gundown, reconstructing the film scores of a formative musical influence, Ennio Morricone, to acclaim in 1986. Spillane and Naked City further demonstrated Zorn's ability to merge and blend musical styles in new and challenging formats.
Zorn spent significant time in Japan in the 1980s and early '90s returning to Lower East Side Manhattan to establish the Tzadik record label in 1995.