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| Frith, Fred
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During the past 3 decades composer, multi-instrumentalist and groundbreaking improviser Fred Frith, has made more recordings, played at more festivals and been involved with more multi-cultural events than anyone could dare shake a stick at. He was a co-instigator in the seminal Artrock bands Henry Cow, Art Bears, Massacre, Keep the Dog, Skeleton Crew, The Fred Frith Guitar Quartet, Naked City...and the list goes on and on. He has played with almost every musical personality equated with the New Music and Experimental Music scenes in every corner of the globe, and continues on an undaunted path of musical exploration, preceeded by none, having been featured on nearly 300 recordings to date. He has also composed "serious" classical music for such notable organisationas as Rova and The Ensemble Modern.
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Frith, Fred: Live In Japan
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| First time on Compact Disc - Fred's classic table-top guitar album. Says Fred: "These concerts were part of a solo tour of Japan organized by the now-defunct magazine Fool's Mate. The music on the CD was first released in 1982 by Recommended Records Japan as a 2 LP box set in a limited edition of 1000. The tapes were returned to Japan after mastering in New York, and at some time during the ensuing 20 years they disappeared. All efforts to unearth them failed. This version was meticulously re-created from 96K vinyl transfers by Tom Dimuzio over a period of several months in 2007, an amazing labour of love.
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Frith, Fred: Nowhere, Sideshow, Thin Air
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| This is Fred's sixth CD of music for dance, featuring three commissions by three different choreographers each sharing, as Fred says ' a certain obsession with melodic deconstruction.' Two of them feature - and were especially written for - the remarkable violinist Carla Kihlstedt. Fred and Carla perform one of them (Fred playing a huge array of instruments here as on all pieces), are joined by Fred Guiliano, (samples) and Gail Brand (trombone) on another, while the third features Fred, Hande Erdem (violin) and Threresa Wong (cello). These are complex studio compositions characterised by a deceptive simplicity, layers and plateaux, rhythm and colour.
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Frith, Fred: Impur II
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| Impur II is totally different from Impur I - which was a deconstructed, spatialised simultaneity of musical events that could only be heard through open windows or by wandering through rooms - Impur 2 took the form of an unannounced performance across which audience members had to stumble by chance (and then collect their friends - or not). Both events formed part of a commission by L'Ecole Nationale de Musique de Villurbanne in May 1996.This recording, painstakingly edited and re-mastered by Fred, appears as a full-on concert by a large 19 strong ensemble with Fred conducting as well as playing. It's built on rhythm, harmony, rock noise, exotic instrumentation, power, complexity and melodic writing - with intermittent stretches of chaos, eccentricity and theatre, and fits comfortably into the aesthetic of his earlier performing ensemble projects, like Gravity, Skeleton Crew and Keep the Dog.
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Frith, Fred: The Happy End Problem
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| An instant Fred classic, 'Happy End' presents two, related, small-ensemble works for 6 and 7 musicians respectively - mostly strings of one sort or another, with percussion, flute, clarinet and electronics. Fred, violinist Carla Kilsteht and percussionist Willie Wynant play throughout providing continuity across the pieces, as the music constantly unfolds into new textures and dialects. Melody, harmony and rhythm are omnipresent, though not always obviously colluding, and the music moves with a constant assurance, never hesitating and never marking time. There are some affinities with Nicola Kodjbashia's luminous 'Solitary Walker' here (which it predates), particularly in its use of minimal instrumentation to maximum effect, popular materials, exquisite articulation and a kind of modest transcendence. The necessity and simplicity of these pieces conceals a catalogue of experimental techniques and novel ideas - there are those who'd have squeezed a score of albums from this material.
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Frith, Fred: Impur
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| In 1996, at the end of a two year residency, Fred organised an event at L'Ecole Nationale de Musique de Villeurbanne in France involving as many of the students as possible, grouped according to their departments - early music, rock, African drumming, classical &c. Each group was set up in a different room in the school building and during the concert the public was encouraged to wander around creating their own mix, or to sit in the courtyard and listen to the sound drifting out through the open windows. For their part, each group of musicians had to play musical material Fred had prepared for them - occasionally they could improvise. In order to co-ordinate all the groups, who naturally couldn't hear each other, everyone followed a precise time-score prepared by Fred (55 minutes regulated by synchronized stopwatches). The entire event was recorded on 4 A-DAT machines, to be mixed down later, and this CD is the result: a lurching, complex and capricious beast with many heads: an orchestra tuning up; a salute to Sonny Blount; a roiling chaotic mass of sound splitting into layers, colliding back together, pullulating, ululating, roaring and sometimes mewing like a kitten.
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Feder, Janet Frith and Fred : Ironic Universe (DVD + CD)
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| On these disks, Denver-based acoustic guitarist Janet Feder furthers her exploration on the instrument, and teams up with another of the world's most respected guitarists, Mr. Fred Frith. A whole gamut of strange techniques, musical strategies, beautiful tunings and ambiences are employed; The outcome is sure bliss for fans of modern, instrumental music. Part avant-garde, part classical, part folk, in fairly equal proportions, this approach has never before been attempted with such striking success. The DVD portion is separated into 2 segments: Janet's videos were beautifully shot and edited by Hollywood film-maker David Quinn, in a professional studio as she played live. Each track is presented in a different setting to embellish the diverse performances. Fred's video is one, longish improvised session from a recent concert in Boulder, Colorado, also professionally filmed and edited by Quinn. Fred abandoned his electric guitar in lieu of his Taylor acoustic for the event, bringing his playing into a new realm, while still managing to put his many toys (bowls, chains, brushes, dowls etc.) to good use.
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Skeleton Crew: Learn To Talk and Country of Blinds (Double CD)
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| A timely reissue of two timeless classics. On the first CD it's just Fred Frith and and Tom Cora, the legendary two man crew who somehow Ð in real time, not with endless overdubs - managed to play all their own instruments (cello, bass, electric guitar, violin, casio) and sing - as well as, between them, constructing the drum parts Ð dislocated into elements with each of them having bits of the kit. This made for some fantastic - and normally unplayable parts - most drummers having only one brain. No one sounded like Skeleton Crew, ever. Devious, complicated, brutally simple, always unexpected, turning on a dime, this was not just a pop band but a tocsin, a call to arms - and in a short recorded life it produced a catalogue of invention that is still breathtaking today.
On the second album, the inspired addition of Zeena Parkins (keyboards, accordion, more drums, more vocals) led to some of the best music of the decade. The recording was rawer, more urgent, the songs standing out in sharp relief; every part essential. And yet - it's a puzzle almost impossible to unravel: how on earth did they ever evolve those dislocated parts and still make them fit so perfectly together? Did I mention the texts? So much to the point, so good. And where are the Skeleton Crews today when we really need them? Both CDs are here, in full, re-mastered by Fred and with 10 extra tracks Ð each as good as anything on the official albums.
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Frith, Fred: Allies
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| Featuring beautifully understated performances from Joey Baron (drums), the late, great master cellist, Tom Cora, and the inimitable sax talents of George Cartwright, ALLIES is the second in the Music For Dance series, pioneered originally on Fred's TECHNOLOGY OF TEARS. While some compositional similarities are reminiscent of that work, ALLIES employs a more organic approach, weaning mostly acoustic elements into Fred's penchant to explore the musical relationship between the mechanical and the natural elements of sound and modern music. Elegant and meticulously crafted surfaces are constantly under attack from unpredictable elements, creating a particular tension that is haunting and quite unlike any of the composer's other works.
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Frith, Fred: Cheap At Half The Price
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| Fred's third LP for the US label Ralph Records, back in 1983, was a collection of gloriously direct pop songs, recorded on a four-track home studio system. Fred played almost all of the instruments: guitar, six string bass, Casio 101 keyboard, violin, xylophone, and home mades. There are some great production ideas, with intrusive samples (Ronald Reagan appears in a memorable moment), and guitars snaking, bending and sliding around the mix. It's quite extraordinary, given the sound quality and the vibrancy of the production ideas, that this was recorded on a four-track recorder. There are influences from European café music (the inspired electronic doodling of ZNR springs to mind), and Frank Zappa, East European traditional music, Cajun, and....er...Sting and the novelty singles of The Flying Lizards all make themselves felt. Fred is joined for cameos on bass by Bill Laswell and Tina Curren, and Hans Bruinnsson provides some great drum samples. The album caused ripples in the 'progressive music snob' circuit at the time, for its apparent simplicity. With the benefit of hindsight, Fred really captured something with his popularisation of sometimes excessively elitist po-faced avant-garde music.
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Frith, Fred: Middle of the Moment
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| Field recordings of traditional singing and drumming, the jaunty accordion and violin music of a travelling circus troupe, the sounds of trucks, trains, wells, winds, flies, fire, thunder, camels, goats and a jackal are woven into a multi- layered, subtly shifting cinematic aural journey. This is Fred's poetic soundtrack CD accompanying the Nicolas Humbert and Werner Penzel documentary film of the same name. Middle of the Moment is a poetic evocation of nomadism; The filmmakers travelled with the Tuereg people in the Sahara desert, and also experienced the exotic wanderings of Cirque 0, an avant garde circus troupe. Fred says:
"I 'travelled' through this material, formed my impressions, and created a 'sound -movie' from them, using a process analogous to that of editing a film. I've never been interested in making a typical film soundtrack record ... My idea is more to create a parallel narrative, free to draw on music that wasn't in the film but was part of the process of making it."
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Frith, Fred: Speechless
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| SPEECHLESS was recorded the next year, and takes up where "Gravity" left off, but is an even more intense endeavor. By this time (Summer 1980) Fred's multi-instrumental virtuosity could not be questioned, and his unison guitar/violin lines had reached stag- gering proportions of complexity, whilst perfectly accompanying his compositional prowess. On this disk effects abound, and more intense field recordings add to the overall energetic approach, while understated rhythms (particularly effective is a recording of a misfunctioning drain-pipe) are sometimes the glue holding together the more quiet pas- sages. Not only is this recording less compact in sonic nature than "Gravity", the level of energy is both more hard-hitting and compelling as well. This is somewhat due to the fact that the backing bands here are MASSACRE and ETRON FOU LELOUBLAN; the latter's drummer (Guigou Chenevier) is especially animated, and brings with him a most fanciful, percussive approach to the music.
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Frith, Fred: Keep the Dog: That House We Lived In
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| KEEP THE DOG is a double disk, live recording of Fred's all-star group, which includes Jean Derome & Rene Lussier (Les Granules), Zeena Parkins (Skeleton Crew, News From Babel), New York sampler artist Bob Ostertag and the legendary drummer Charles Hayward (Quiet Sun, This Heat, Camberwell Now). To call the performances "lively" would be an understatement, and although there is a fair amount of excellent group improvisation (each of the members are known for their expertise in the field) the composed sections, which far outnumber the ad libitums, are played as tightly and energetically as any group could ever hope for. Herein we are treated to a musical smorgasbord of Fred's past repetoire from albums like "Cheap at 1/2 the Price", "Country of Blinds", "Who Needs Ememies ?" "Step Accross the Border" and "Gravity", as well as lesser known pieces rejuvenated especially for this ensemble. While each composition has kept its integrity in these live settings, the strengths of these particular performers breathes new life into them, and eagerly sheds light on each of their best assests. Needless to say, there has rarely been so much accredited talent together on one stage before, and the result is thrilling.
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Frith, Fred: Step Across the Border
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| The soundtrack for the documentary film made about Fred over a decade's period of time, following him from NYC, to Japan, through Europe, etc. Many guest artists appeared over the years, and many of them are caught here, either accentuating things musically, or acting as the impetus for Fred's endeavors. The multiplicity of styles, brought about by circumstance, chance, and necessity makes this, probably more than any other single recording, a showcase for the broad scope of Fred's versatility, both as a performer and a composer. We are treated to rare, sonic glimpses of the New York scene's glory days, woodshedding with Bittova and Fajt in the Czech Republic, an intimate encounter with Haco in Japan, and an English seaside improv with Tim Hodgkinson (during which the seagulls join in), to mention a few. Each setting is as completely different as its location and place in time, and each piece acts as a sort of musical "snapshot" of that particular moment in Fred's musical career.
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Frith, Fred: Prints
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| Dabbling around within song forms, while a particular forte for Fred, sometimes seems to take a back seat to his more improvisational or academic outings. So when a full album of "Songs" is issued, it really is cause for celebration. The amazing thing here is that these songs were produced with very little preparation before entering the studio, leaving Fred to compose, arrange, perform and mix these pieces using the recording medium as a compositional tool. While the initial impressions might be those of "Pop" music and its regenerative forms, each piece is tweaked, tho just enough to belay the necessary amount of subversive elements required to go "beyond" that genre, and into a world where chance happenstances and experimental tendencies give rise to much more. To these ends, the subject matter in each case was developed around whatever happened to be a hot story in the newspaper on the day of the recording. The music is all over the map, and each topic is examined in a spur-of-the-moment sort of way, but with long-lasting and infectious results.
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Frith, Fred: Guitar Solos
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| Fred's revolutionary first solo album from 1974, on which he plays solo guitar (mostly electric, in real time using very few effects) with a perplexing degree of finesse, considering the radical nature of the style explored. An assortment of found objects are often attached to his guitar strings to alter the tonal possibilities, and an extra pick-up was mounted on the head-stock to amplify harmonics usually just barely audible when the instrument is played in a normal fashion. Often the strings are struck, bowed, rubbed, sctratched or plucked with found objects as well. While this description might easily resemble a recipe for aimless noise, in the hands of the world's foremost prepared guitarist what ensues from these extended techniques is absolutely musical, and exudes tonalities of a marvelously unique nature. Fred's creative restraint often allows the instrument to speak for itself - resonances and sustaining sounds trail off of their own volition, or carry on by themselves, with no interference from the artist- who, by virtue of being in control of his instrument, seems to be solely motivated by it.
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Frith, Fred: Accidental
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| Pulsating rhythms and chords provide a backbone of energy upon which Fred builds up colorful musical events for Tel Aviv's Bat Sheva Dance Ensemble to co- ordinate choreography by. There is a strange dichotomy between both the understated and the harsh sounds employed here, some of which flow beautifully as others approach factory-gone-wrong proportions. While some sounds are bizarre and disturbed, those accompanying them can be gorgeous and sublime, creating a contradiction that is as baffling as it is musically artful. The best examples here are, "Their Blood is Black and Yellow" (where some of Fred's most brutal guitar improvising to date is offset by a glorious set of organ chords), and "Incoming", where electronically slashing "scream- guitars" are interspersed with the quiet cryings of cleaner tones, both soloing over a steadily sampled backing track. Elsewhere, the strange solo vocalisings and mouth noises Fred, mostly working within a set of "rules", but with greatly heightened parameters, where the unexpected often becomes highlighted.
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Frith, Fred: Gravity
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| Fred's 1st post Henry Cow/Art Bears solo album deftly explores the sonic possibilities of all things connected to the concept of "Dance" via an array of apt syles. Everything from Rock to Jazz to Folk to Ethnic is explored here, in Fred's own way, with rhythms often cris-crossing one another, and an amazing amount of musical counterpoint accentuating his trademark, melodically angular guitar/violin style and aggressive bass work. Throughout much of the revelling, field recordings are used in conjunction with compositional forms, adding additional, lush atmospheres into the mix. Joining Fred on this recording are RIO legends SAMLA MAMMAS MANNA from Sweden, Maryland's own THE MUFFINS, and members of Univers Zero & Aksak Maboul.
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Frith, Fred: The Previous Evening
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| Former Henry Cow guitarist FRED FRITH pays homage to three giants of contemporary classical music, John Cage, Morton Feldman and Earle Brown. In his own inimitable fashion, Frith has incorporated the chosen composer's own working methods into each of the three pieces that make up The Previous Evening. As he explains in the enclosed booklet regarding his John Cage homage; "Fragments of text heard in Part 1 were taken at random from John Cage's book Silence. Tape editing, the structure of events, and dynamic markings in this section were also determined using chance methods." Elsewhere an Australian dawn chorus illustrates a section of "Part 3 (Homage To Earle Brown)", while other sound sources include works by Cage, Schumann, Mozart and "some bits and pieces of my own earlier work." The result is a record which shines new light on the work of Cage, Feldman and Brown, as well as illuminating another side of Fred Frith's constantly evolving career as a musician and composer.
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