Oregon is an American jazz and world music group, with core members Ralph Towner (guitar, piano, synthesizer, trumpet), Paul McCandless (woodwind instruments), and Glen Moore (double bass, violin, piano). Jazz master Louis Armstrong was one of the best loved and best known of all jazz musicians. ... This article is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... Ralph Towner is an American acoustic guitarist. ... The classical guitar typically has 3 nylon and 3 nickel-wound strings. ... This article is about the modern musical instrument. ... A classic FM synthesizer, the Yamaha DX7. ... The trumpet is the highest fart producing instrument in any register, above herbie. ... Paul McCandless is an American jazz woodwind player and composer. ... A woodwind instrument is a wind instrument in which sound is produced by blowing through a mouthpiece against an edge or by a vibrating reed, and in which the pitch is varied by opening or closing holes in the body of the instrument. ... Side and front views of a modern double bass with a French bow. ... The violin is a stringed musical instrument that has four strings tuned a perfect fifth apart. ... This article is about the modern musical instrument. ...

Towner, McCandless, Moore, and Collin Walcott (percussion, sitar, tabla) met as members of world music pioneer Paul Winter's "Consort" ensemble in the late 1960s. They broke away from Winter in 1970 to form their own group, Oregon, which they named after Towner's and Moore's home state. They recorded their first record in 1970, but the label, Increase Records, went out of business before it could be released. (It was released by Vanguard in 1980 as Our First Record.) The group's first release was Music of Another Present Era in 1972. With that debut and its follow-ups Distant Hills and Winter Light (all on Vanguard), Oregon established itself as one of the leading improvisational groups of its day, blending Indian and Western classical music with jazz, folk, and avant-garde elements. The group released numerous albums on Vanguard throughout the 1970s, then made three records for Elektra. After a couple years hiatus devoted to their individual projects, the group resumed recording for ECM in 1983. Percussion instruments are music instruments played by being struck, shaken, rubbed or scraped, hence the percussive name. ... Premla Shahane playing a sitar, 1927 A sitar The sitar is a Hindustani classical instrument. ... The tabla is a widely popular Indian percussion instrument used in the classical, popular and religious music of the northern Indian subcontinent. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... Folk music, in the original sense of the term, is music by and of the people. ... Avant-jazz (also known as avant-garde jazz) is a style of music and improvisation that combines elements of avant-garde art music composition with elements of traditional jazz. ... ECM (Editions of Contemporary Music) is a record label founded in 1969 by Manfred Eicher, who has continued to take an active interest in the music released by the label, acting as producer on most of its recordings. ...

During a 1984 concert tour, Walcott was killed in an automobile accident in East Germany. Oregon temporarily disbanded, but reformed by 1987 to record Ecotopia (its final album for ECM) with new percussionist Trilok Gurtu. Gurtu made two further records as a member of the group, but by 1993 he had left; the group recorded two albums as a trio after his departure. With new member Mark Walker on drum kit, Oregon assumed a more conventional jazz orientation beginning with the 1996 album Northwest Passage. The German Democratic Republic (GDR) (German: Deutsche Demokratische Republik), also commonly known as East Germany, was a communist state that existed from 1949 to 1990 in the former Soviet occupation zone of Germany. ... Trilok Gurtu is an Indian percussionist, widely acclaimed by his unique and awesome approach to music. ...

Recordings

• Our First Record (recorded 1970, first released 1980)
• Music of Another Present Era (1972)
• Distant Hills (1973)
• Winter Light (1974)
• In Concert (1975)
• Together (1976), with drummer Elvin Jones
• Friends (1977)
• Violin (1978), with violinist Zbigniew Seifert
• Out of the Woods (1978)
• Moon and Mind (1979)
• Roots in the Sky (1979)
• In Performance (1980)
• Oregon (1983)
• Crossing (1985)
• Ecotopia (1987)
• 45th Parallel (1989)
• Always, Never and Forever (1992)
• Troika (1993)
• Beyond Words (1995)
• Northwest Passage (1997)
• In Moscow (2000), with the Moscow Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra
• Live at Yoshi's (2002)
• Prime (2005)