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Paul William Rutherford was born on February 29, 1940 in Greenwich, South East London, England. He initially played saxophone but switched to trombone. During the Sixties, he taught at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

By 1970, Rutherford, guitarist Derek Bailey and bassist Barry Guy formed the improvising group Iskra 1903, sans drums and percussion, permitting the players to explore a range of textures and dynamics which set it apart from such other contemporary improvising ensembles. The group stayed together until 1973, recording a double album from Incus, later reissued with much bonus material on the 3-CD set Chapter One.

The group’s name is the Russian word for spark and was the title of the Iskra revolutionary newspaper edited by Lenin. The “1903” designation means 20th-century music for the trio. Another edition of the group included Evan Parker under Iskra 1904, and Rutherford at one point assembled a 12-piece ensemble called Iskra 1912.

The group was later revived with Philipp Wachsmann replacing Bailey, a phase of the group’s life that lasted from roughly 1977 to 1995, documenting their earlier work on Chapter Two (Emanem, 2006) and its final recordings were issued on Maya (Iskra 1903) and Emanem (Frankfurt 1991).

Rutherford went on to play with Globe Unity Orchestra, London Jazz Composer’s Orchestra, Centipede, the Mike Westbrook Orchestra, and the Orckestra, a merger of avant-rock group Henry Cow, the Mike Westbrook Brass Band and folk singer Frankie Armstrong. He also played a very small number of gigs with Soft Machine.

He is perhaps most famous for solo trombone improvisations. His album The Gentle Harm of the Bourgeoisie is a landmark recording in solo trombone and his 1983 trio album Gheim, recorded at the Bracknell Jazz Festival is another acclaimed work. A film soundtrack was separately released as Buzz Soundtrack.

A major player in the British free improvisation scene and part of the European free jazz scene, he was one of the first to use unorthodox playing techniques for improvisation. Trombonist Paul Rutherford, one of the first to use trombone multiphonics, i.e. he sang into the trombone and blew at the same time, passed away from cirrhosis of the liver and a ruptured aorta on August 5, 2007, at the age of 67.

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