Mark Howell is an American musician, composer,Howell's analysis of La Salle Bells published by archaeology group by Debbie Burt Myers. The Neshoba Democrat 10 August 2008. Retrieved 18 August 2011. ethnomusicologist, ethnomusicologist, and music archaeologist.
Early life and education Howell was born in Philadelphia, Mississippi in 1952 and moved to New York City in 1982. In Mississippi he learned and played guitar with local Blues musicians, including Foots Backstrum and Wade Walker. He also played with another Philadelphia native, Marty Stewart (guitarist with Johnny Cash). Before moving to New York City, Howell lived briefly in Jackson where he played and/or recorded with many Rock and Jazz musicians, including Tim Lee, Al Fielder, Cassandra Wilson, and Evan Gallagher.
In 1996 he earned an M.F.A. in music composition at SUNY Stony Brook; and in 2004 a Ph.D. in ethnomusicology from the CUNY Graduate Center with a dissertation called "An Ethnoarchaeological Investigation of Highland Guatemalan Maya Dance-Plays."2004 Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology, The Graduate Center, City University of New York (CUNY). Before then, between 1974-1975, he attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston, graduated from New York's Institute of Audio Research in 1974, and received a BA in Music in 1980 from the University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg.
Career In 1983 he formed an avant-garde post-rock band called Better Than Death (BTD) with bass clarinetist Michael Lytle. Other members at various times included Coby Batty, Jeff Myers, and Erik Keil. In 1986 he collaborated with Etron Fou saxophonist Bruno Meillier to form a Euro-American group called Zero Pop. They recorded All the Big Mystics and Glows in the Dark. In between Zero Pop tours BTD recorded Swimman (1987), and followed that release with a U.S. tour. Between 1986 and 1994 Zero Pop toured Europe seven times and the United States three.
Howell played guitar on the Curlew record North America, and met Martin Bisi, Rick Brown, Tom Cora, and Fred Frith. In 1989 he and Frith, Nick Didkovsky, and Rene Lussier formed the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet. In 1989 Howell formed a third band, Timber, with drummer Rick Brown and bass player Faye Hunter who was later replaced by Jenny Wade. Between 1989 and 1996 Timber made two U.S. tours and one in Europe. They released one CD, Parts and Labor, and were included on Matador's LP and CD New York Eye and Ear Control, as well as on two of Elliott Sharp's State of the Union compilation CDs. Howell's involvement with the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet between 1989 and 1995 included five European tours, several U.S. performances and the recording of "The As Usual Dance Towards the Other Flight to What Is Not", which was released on Frith's CD Quartets. He also played with Frith, Didkovsky, Lussier, and others at the Brooklyn Academy of Music performance of "In Memory", in 1989.
In addition to his band work, Howell has composed for Lynn Shapiro (at the American Dance Festival 1994), Amy Sue Rosen, Diane Torr, and Stephanie Artz. He was also commissioned by several ensembles including "North By South" (1993) for percussionist Kevin Norton, and "To the Heart" (1997) for the ten-piece mixed ensemble New Ear. His composition scores were published by Frog Peak Music.
Howell has also researched the music of Pre-Columbian America. He has presented papers and published books and journals on topics related to music archaeology (see below). In 2006 he became the director of the Winterville Mounds site, an archaeology park and museum in the Mississippi Delta administered by the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
Music Archaeology Theories and Discoveries In his research on Maya dance-plays (bailes) in Guatemala, Howell concurred with Henrietta Yurchenco, Dennis Tedlock, and other scholars, that the baile, Ra'binal Achi, contained Pre-Columbian music elements, which he isolated to include song structures controlled by rhythmic patterns on a slit-drum, specific instrumentation assigned to specific baile types, and an aesthetic preference of timbre over melody. The Ra'binal Achi slit-drum patterns incorporated a rhythmic system utilizing additive and subtractive patterns (not unlike Minimalism in Western Art Music.) In his analysis of European trading bells in the American southeast he discovered a Native American preference for high-pitch sounds over low-pitch ones, as well as propensity to re-function European trade items into sound makers. Also in the southeast, he collaborated with Jim Rees in proving that a cane flute found in the Breckenridge rock shelter in northwest Arkansas to be the oldest double-chambered duct flute known in America, with implications that construction, function, and even language associated with the flute may have accompanied the builders as they possibly migrated north to the Great Lakes region centuries before European contact. Howell's recent work deciphering Maya murals in Chajul, Guatemala (as part of the COMACH research team) implies the early introduction of the European Baroque guitar in the Guatemalan highlands. Moreover, that its unique tuning system (with double strings tuned from bottom to top, AA down to DD up to GG up to BB up to EE) has been transferred to standard six-string guitars used in specific Highland Maya rituals. In addition to his Native American research, Howell has conducted music archaeology work on African American music, where he validated a "worked" glass tradition beginning in the 17th century that may have led to the bottle-neck slide, along with a preference for double-framed monochords over single-frame ones, and a use of performance spaces generating higher over lower acoustic volume. He believes that the Blues Guitar should be characterized as a six-string "diddly bow" rather than a playing style on a standard Euro-American six-string guitar.
Select Music Compositions 2013 "Architecture", music-dance piece for trumpet and computer, premiered in 2013 by composer, with dancer Stephanie Artz at the Jobe Auditorium (Delta State University), Cleveland, MS. 2009 "Nothing/Something Else", music-dance piece in five parts; for electric guitar, computer, trumpet, and tuba, premiered in 2009 by the composer (guitar and trumpet), Mark Snyder (computer and tuba), with dancers Stephanie Artz, Erin Mulligan, and the Sunflower County Freedom Project, at Still Our Only Future: Symposium for William Grant Still, Natchez, MS. 2006 "Maya", for electric guitar, funnel (homemade saxophone), "live" (digital multi-track program), premiered in 2006 by Inconvenient Music at the Festival des Musiques Innovatrices de Saint-Etienne, France. 2005 "Furors", for oboe, accordion, and double bass, commissioned by Trio Akabasso, SUNY Stony Brook, NY. 1997 "To The Heart", for ten-piece mixed ensemble, premiered in 1997 by New Ear in Kansas City,MO.; arranged for strings, piano and percussion, premiered in 1998 by Sirius String Quartet, Jean Schneider (piano) and Danny Tunick (percussion) at Roulette, NYC. 1997 "Of Miracles and Magnetism", for string orchestra, premiered in 1997 by the USM String Orchestra at the Twenty-fifth Anniversary of the USM Dance Department. 1996 "For a Birthday", for electric violin and soprano, premiered in 1996 by Painted Carp at the Mixed Messages Festival, Context Studio, NYC. 1995 "The Quakening", electric guitar solo, premiered by composer in 1998 at the Soho Arts Festival, NYC. 1995 "Sugarlea", tape collage for choreographer Amy Sue Rosen, premiered in 1995 at Dia Arts Center, NYC. 1995 "Like Woods Around", for electric guitar quartet, premiered in 1995 by The Fred Frith Guitar Quartet at Klepeniersdoelen, Middelberg, Netherlands. 1994 "Cement", electric guitar solo, premiered in 1994 by composer at the American Dance Festival, Durham, N.C.; and at the Lincoln Center Outdoors Festival, New York; (dance choreography by Lynn Shapiro); also performed by Mauro Franceschi in 2001 at La Scala de San Telmo, Buenos Aires, and featured on his tours in South America and Europe. 1993 "A Short Sun", for string quartet, premiered in 1993 by Sirius String Quartet at the New Chamber Music Festival, NYC. 1993 "North By South", solo percussion, commissioned and premiered by Kevin Norton in 1993 at Roulette, NYC. 1990 "The History of Magic", for electric guitar quartet, premiered in 1990 by The Fred Frith Guitar Quartet at The Alternative Museum, NYC.
Select Discography (composer and/or performer) 2024 Seagull Brain (MH with Nick Didkovsky and Chris Cochrane) CD. Punos Music. https://doctornerve.bandcamp.com/album/seagull-brain. 2021 Screaming into the Yawning Vacuum of Victory, (MH with Nick Didkovsky) CD. Punos Music. https://doctornerve.bandcamp.com/album/screaming-into-the-yawning-vacuum-of-victory. 2009 Mark Howell, MP3 streaming. https://myspace.com/nanihwaya . 2007 Inconvenient Music, MP3 streaming. https://myspace.com /inconvenientmusic. 1999 Alleluia Anyway: Remembering Tom Cora (with the band Curlew), CD. Tzadik. 1997 Binky Boy (compilation, with the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet), CD. Punos Music. 1995 New York Guitars, CD. CRI. 1994 Quartets (with the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet), CD. Rec Rec Zürich. 1993-1996 Poetic Silhouettes Vols. 1, 2, and 3 (, CDs. AMF. 1993 Transforms: The Nerve Event Projects, CD. Cuneiform. 1992 Parts and Labor (Timber), CD and LP. Rift and Rough Trade London. 1992 Glows in the Dark (Zero Pop), CD. Rec Rec Zürich. 1991 New York Eye and Ear Control, CD and LP. Matador. 1990-1991 Vox Vulgaries Vols. 1 and 2 (CDs and Cassette Tapes. A/Rivista, Divergo. 1987 All the Big Mystics (with the band Zero Pop), LP. Rec Rec Zürich. 1987 Swimman (with the band Better Than Death), LP. Lost/Twin Tone. 1986 North America (with the band Curlew), LP. Möers (1986); reissued as CD, Cuneiform (2002).
Select publications 2015-Present Co-Editor, Flower World: Music Archaeology of the Americas. Mundo Florido Arqueomusicología de las Américas. general editor Arnd Adje Both (With Matthias Stöckli), published by Ēkhō Verlag, Berlin. (Seven volumes published to date.) 2025 Recent Investigations on the Unique Maya Wall Paintings from Chajul (Guatemala). Investigaciones recientes sobre las singulares pinturas murales mayas de Chajul (Guatemala) (with Jarosław 'Zrałka, Monika Banach, Víctor castillo, et al.), estudio de cultura maya LVIII (spring-summer), published by British Archaeological Reports (BAR), London 2025 "Pre-Columbian Music of Veracruz/Mexican Gulf Coast" in Dizionario enciclopedico universale della musica e dei musicisti / DEUMM Onlin., ed. Zdravko Blazekovic. Administered by RILM, New York. 2025 "Musical Instruments in the Chajul Murals: Archaeo-and Ethnomusicological Interpretation" in Dancing for the Saints. The Ixil Murals of Chajul, El Quiché, Guatemala, eds. Jarosław Źrałka and Monika Banuch (co-author Igor Sarmientos), Dumbarton Oaks, Washington D.C. 2025 "The House of Twelve Doors: Animals, Flowers, and Musical Instruments in the Tz'unun Dance-Play of Chajul" in Dancing for the Saints. The Ixil Murals of Chajul, El Quiché, Guatemala, eds. Jarosław Źrałka and Monika Banuch (co-authors Monika Banach and Lucas Asicona Ramírez), Dumbarton Oaks, Washington D.C. 2025 "Chronicle of a Native American Music Reconstruction Venture: Experimental Ethno-Archaeomusicology/Winterville Mounds Instrument Reconstruction, Experimental Modeling, and Composition Project" in Music Archaeology's Paradox, ed. Miriam Kolar. (co-authors Paul Hamel and Timothy Archambault) (open source in 2025) 2025 "The Acoustics and Sound Environment of Early Delta Blues" in Archaeoacoustics: Scientific Exploration of Sound in Archaeology, ed. Miriam Kolar. (open-source in 2025) 2024 "Pre-Columbian Maya Valveless Tube Maya Trumpets" in Journal of Music Archaeology, Vol. I 2023 "African American Native American Music Syncretism" in Field Hollers and Freedom Songs, ed. Sadie Turnipseed. Vernon Press, Wilmington, DE