Seminal avant-garde composer, singer-songwriter, cellist, and disco producer Arthur Russell prolifically created music that spanned both pop and the transcendent possibilities of abstract art. Though posthumously regarded as one of the most influential musicians of all time, his profound talent was never truly acknowledged before his untimely death in 1992.

His long time collaborators and friends included Philip Glass, Allen Ginsberg and David Byrne, the latter with whom he produced eccentric disco hits under the moniker Dinosaur L which became pre Studio 54 hits.

Shunning the conventionality of ‘genre’ he became the master of minimalist symphonies (‘First Thought, Best Thought’) and experimental...