Fred Frith
In the 1990 film made about him, Step Across the Border, Fred Frith plays a guitar lying flat on a table, worked with brushes, chains and bows: not an instrument to be held but an object to be questioned. That gesture holds fifty years together. Born in England in 1949, he founded Henry Cow in 1968, then Art Bears, Massacre and Skeleton Crew, and recorded alongside Robert Wyatt, Derek Bailey, John Zorn and Brian Eno. He has written long pieces for Ensemble Modern and the Rova Saxophone Quartet, appears on more than four hundred albums, and has spent decades teaching improvisation.
I Dream of You Jumping
Fred Frith on guitar, Louis Sclavis on clarinets and soprano saxophone, Jean-Pierre Drouet on percussion and objects, live at Victoriaville on 21 May 2000: one extended improvisation from abstract textures to folk-like melody.
Nous Autres
Fred Frith and René Lussier's duo, recorded at the 1986 Victoriaville festival and finished at Studio Victor: guitars, bass, violin, voices and tape in short, playful pieces. The CD adds four tracks recorded in New York in 1992.
Before And After Science (LP)
1977 Italian edition (with no prints) on Polydor of the 1977 solo album,, as all Eno's early albums an experimental rock masterpiece. Featuring Robert Fripp, Can's Jaki Liebezeit, Genesis' Phil Collins, Henry Cow's Fred Frith, Moebius & Roedelius.
Music For Films (LP)
Original Italian edition on Polydor of the actual first ambient album from 1978 before the Ambient series, featuring Robert Fripp, Fred Frith, John Cale and éhil Collins among others. Classic.
Nature
"I have been fascinated by the sound and potential of gongs since I first heard Stockhausen's Mikrophonie 1 in the late 1960s. When I moved to Oakland in 1999 I discovered the work of Karen Stackpole, one of the few percussionists in the world specializing entirely in gongs, and attended several of her performances. I always tried to imagine how I could combine my own sonic vocabulary with her incredibly rich array, and we enthusiastically agreed to a musical meeting which somehow kept being pos…
The Big Gundown (John Zorn Plays the Music of Ennio Morricone) (LP)
Original German edition with gatefold sleeve of the 1986 hommage to the wonderful music of Ennio Morricone from the NY sax player and composer, surrounded by Arto Lindsay, Bill Frisell, Fred Frith, Jody Harris, Christian Marclay, Anton Fier and many others.
Speechless
Henry Cow's and Art Bears' Fred Frith experimental and sometimes tuneful beautiful 1981 album for the Resident's Ralph Records, featuring Etron Fou Leloublan and Massacre's Bill Laswell and Fred Maher. With original innersleeve.
Il Gesto Del Suono
2009 release ** Featuring: Marcel Duchamp, John Cage, Steve Jansen, Demetrio Stratos, Emanuele Casale, Robert Ashley, Stefano Scodanibbio, Edoardo Sanguineti, Nine Horses, Walter Prati, Robert Wyatt, Fred Frith, Massimiliano Viel, Picchio Dal Pozzo.
Guitar Solos (LP)
Original 1974 UK edition of the first solo album of adventurous guitar explorations by Henry Cow member.
With Friends Like These (LP)
Original 1979 LP on Metalanguage, the first encounter by the two giant guitarists.
Guitar Solos 2
Original first Italian edition on Caroline from 1978 of the second volume of the Guitar Solos series featuring Derek Bailey, Fred Frith, G.F. Fitzgerald and Hans Reichel. With original innersleeve. Never re-issued on either CD or LP.
Guitar Solos 3
Original first US edition on Red from 1979 of the third volume of the Guitar Solos series featuring Henry Kaiser, Chip Handy, Peter Cusack, Keith Rowe, Fred Frith, Eugene Chadbourne, Davey Williams and Akira Iijima. Never re-issued on either CD or LP.
Nil
1995 release **
Naked City
1990 release ** "Naked City was formed a year and a half ago to give Zorn a focused vehicle for his omnivorous compositions and rearrangements. Taking its name from the gritty pulp TV show ("There are eight million stories in the ..."), this collection of downtown all-stars – John Zorn, Bill Frisell on guitar, Wayne Horvitz on keyboards, Fred Frith on bass, Joey Baron on percussion – did a four-night, eight-set stint at the Knitting Factory, in New York City, last summer, never repeating a tune.…
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The Life And Behavior
A compelling collaboration between guitarist Fred Frith and innovative harpist Shelley Burgon — known for her work with Anthony Braxton, Trevor Dunn, and Okkyung Lee — in a series of concise and precise improvisations recorded in Oakland, CA, in 2002 and 2005, as Burgon blends seamlessly with Frith's acoustic guitar to create seemingly telepathic synchronicity and an expansive sonic palette.
In Zebulon
In the early-to-mid aughts, in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, Zebulon Café Concert was the epicenter of creative music of all stripes and flavors. Proprietors Guillaume Blestel and brothers Jef and Joce Soubiran passionately created and curated a space where musicians and the music could fully blossom unfettered by norms and conventions. Zebulon was also the preferred haunt of legendary artist, poet and filmmaker Jonas Mekas who had recently moved back into the neighborhood after lea…
Everything Depends On Us: Zebulon L.A. Live Recording Vol. 1
Imagined by Zebulon and made possible by the artists who answered our call for support during the extended period when our doors were shut due to Covid, this compilation captures just a handful of the many magic moments that have occurred on our stage over the years.
All of the tracks featured on this album were recorded live at Zebulon LA between 2018 and 2020 – with the exception of the title track by Jonas Mekas, which was recorded at Zebulon Brooklyn in 2009. Jonas is posthumously with us in…
Live Improvisations
1990 release ** "For fans of that particular brand of noisy avant-gardism for which Robert Christgau coined the term "skronk," guitarist/violinist Fred Frith and saxophonist Tim Hodgkinson need no introduction. Charter members of the 1970s avant rock outfit Henry Cow, each has spent a lot of time making unspeakable noises with his instrument, and often those noises have been unspeakably glorious. This collection of live recordings -- all of them taken from live gigs around England in May of 1990…
Guitar Talk: Conversations with VIsionary Players
Secrets of master musicians, revealed in conversation. Guitar Talk offers interviews with many of the most creative guitarists of our time. This new book presents these conversations, between Joel Harrison and Nels Cline, Pat Metheny, Fred Frith, Bill Frisell, Julian Lage, Elliott Sharp, Michael Gregory Jackson, Ben Monder, Anthony Pirog, Henry Kaiser, Mike and Leni Stern, Vernon Reid, Mary Halvorson, Nguyên Le, Rez Abbasi, Ava Mendoza, Liberty Ellman, Brandon Ross, Wayne Krantz, Dave Fiuczynski…
Z Sides
Cosa Brava is an experimental rock and free improvisation group formed in March 2008 in Oakland, California, by multi-instrumentalist and composer Fred Frith. The band comprises Frith on guitar, Zeena Parkins on keyboards and accordion, Carla Kihlstedt on violin, Matthias Bossi on drums, Shahzad Ismaily on bass and The Norman Conquest on sound manipulation. All About Jazz described their music as somewhere between folk, Celtic, modern chamber, Latin, funk, Eastern, and prog-rock. Cosa Brava reco…
Haze - Almanacco Di CUltura Di Sonora N.2 (Magazine)
*Italian Language Edition* Un libro/almanacco con cadenza quadrimestrale che raccoglie saggi, interviste, approfondimenti sulla ricerca sonora contemporanea per un concetto allargato di musica. Nel secondo volume: Fred Frith, Paolo Conte, William Parker, Erik Satie, Roberto Masotti, Stefano Scodanibbio, Toshio Hosokawa e altro ancora...
Eye To Ear
2024 stock. Famous as an improviser and a rock guitarist (Henry Cow, Art Bears, Residents, Massacre, Skeleton Crew, French/Frith/Kaiser/Thompson), Fred Frith is still highly under-rated as a composer. Since relocating to Germany in the early '90s, Frith has composed soundtracks for a number of films and has chosen his finest for his first Tzadik release, Eye To Ear.
Guitar Solos / Fifty
Big tip! Lunching into 2024 after after a stellar 2023, Week-End Records delivers one of their most important offerings to date, the first vinyl reissue of Fred Frith’s seminal 1974 solo debut, “Guitar Solos”, in more than 40 years, marking the album’s 50th anniversary. A groundbreaking work in the field of avant-garde recordings that changed everything in its wake, incorporating a startling range of sonorities and approaches within constrained means, to celebrate its half-century mark, Frith ha…
Something About This Landscape For Ensemble
From his early days with Henry Cow, Fred Frith was seen as a brilliant instrumentalist and improviser, but what has been overlooked is what a first-rate composer he is. This recording offers both aspects. His most complex orchestral composition and two selected improvisations with the Ensemble Musiques Nouvelles. Fred Frith, as an infusion of energy and inspiration. 'Something about this Landscape was commissioned by Ars Musica in 2018. I composed the piece during a residency at Lou Harrison's s…
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Live At Loft Shinjuku Tokyo Japan 23 July '81
Live At Loft Shinjuku Tokyo Japan 23 July '81 (with Totsuzen Danball) is a jazz related improv/composition music live album recording by Fred Frith released in 1982.
Learn To Talk
* Temporary nice price * Reissue of a true avantgarde-rock classic: Skeleton Crew were the maverick duo of Ex-Henry Cow guitarist Fred Frith and the great late cellist Tom Cora. Formed during one of Frith's early American residencies, Skeleton Crew was a legendary two man crew who somehow - in real time, managed to play all their instruments, cello, bass, electric guitar, violin, vocals - as well as, drum parts dislocated between the two of them. No one sounded like Skeleton Crew, ever. An unpre…
Dancing Like Dust
Núria Andorrà is a percussionist, improviser and composer from a classical and contemporary music background but always drawing from other sources of inspiration. Núria proposes a universe where images, sound and the body come together to create and transmit from an interdisciplinary perspective. She has performed with Agustín Fernández, Fred Frith, Lê Quan Nihn, Joëlle Léandre, Mats Gustafsson, Nate Wooley, and Joe Morris, as well as collaborating with Carles Santos, Hector Parra, Matmos and ot…
To Sail, To Sail
One of the most profound solo statements to date from a musical master who has been crossing musical borders for over three decades! Concentrating exclusively on the acoustic guitar, Fred Frith stretches himself and the instrument like never before, performing with the eloquence and grace of a master in peak form. With a prodigious technique and elegant sense of maturity he draws upon a lifetime of study and experience to bring together influences as diverse as classical, blues, folk, gypsy and …
Back To Life
*In process of stocking. 2022 stock.* Anyone who thinks of multifaceted composer/performer Fred Frith primarily as a guitar player with Henry Cow and for his 1974 album Guitar Solos is way out of touch with what he's been up to in, say, more than 30 years. The 2008 release of Back to Life on Tzadik represents a good opportunity to reconnect with Frith and summarize what he has been doing since the heady days of his scrambling, intense electric guitar improvisations like "Alienated Industrial Sea…
The Sugar Factory
*In process of stocking. 2022 stock.* Dynamic and astonishing music from two of the world’s greatest musical pioneers, this is another special project from multi-instrumentalist/composer/improviser Fred Frith who has been bravely crossing musical borders since the early 1970’s. These remarkable duo sessions were recorded during the filming of Thomas Riedelsheimer’s exquisite documentary Touch the Sound about Scottish virtuoso percussionist Evelyn Glennie. Combining the unpredictability of an imp…
Clearing
*In process of stocking. 2022 stock.* Fred Frith is one of the world’s greatest originals on the guitar, a composer/performer who has been at the forefront of avant garde music since the early ’70s. Clearing is his first solo guitar recording in over twenty years (since his classic Live In Japan of 1981) and his first solo studio recording since his groundbreaking Guitar Solos of 1974. Of the three existing solo recordings by this quirky musical master, Clearing is undoubtedly the most dynamic, …
Eye To Ear III
*In process of stocking. 2022 stock.* Fred Frith continues to be one of the most important composer/performers of his generation—a groundbreaking, genre busting musical master whose work ranges from improvisation to rock, classical, folk and more. The third volume of his film soundtrack music is his most diverse and accomplished work to date, and includes studio work from the past six years. Features some of the greatest musicians in the Bay Area music scene.
Eye To Ear II
*In process of stocking. 2022 stock.* With a career spanning over three decades, Fred Frith continues his fruitful relationship on Tzadik with this, his fifth release in as many years. Always breaking new ground, Eye to Ear II, the second volume dedicated to his work for films, is an adventurous voyage into unexplored territory. Four amazing sound collages, improvisations and lyrical dance music from one of the most consistently original composer/performers working today.
Pacifica
*In process of stocking. 2022 stock.* Pacifica is a major new composition by the world-famous guitarist, improvisor and composer, Fred Frith. Over an hour in length and composed for a large ensemble of winds, strings and percussion, Pacifica sets the poetry of Pablo Neruda into a seductive and hypnotizing sound world that slowly metamorphoses into something altogether different. Lyrical written passages, inspired improvisations, sensual vocals and provocative sound effects all come together into…
Duo (Victoriaville) 2005
Anthony Braxton and Fred Frith each have about as close a relationship to the Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville as just about any non-Canadians. The first release on Victo, the label run by the producers of the annual Canadian festival, was a guitar duo with Frith and Rene Lussier; the second was a duet between Braxton and Derek Bailey. Until this year, each had released three discs on the label. But 2005 was the Year of Braxton and the label has released three new Brax…
Hello, I Must Be Going
Two masters who rarely play together--guitarist Fred Frith and saxophonist Evan Parker--performing together as a duo at the 30th Musique Actuelle Festival in Victoriaville, Canada for an amazing exchange of ideas and intensely subtle dialog.
The Fred Records Story Vol. 1-2-3 Bundle
Complete Bundle of the three box collection of The Fred Records Story by Fred Frith, one of the most innovative guitarists and composers of his generation, containing 27 ReR CDs, 3 bonus Fred title and 3 fat historic booklet with artwork, photographs, extensive notes and other comments by Fred, all packed into in sturdy boxes.Vol. 1 Rocking The Boat (9CD Box)
Box one contains: The legendary Guitar Solos, Gravity (with Etron Fou Leloublan and Samla Mammas Manna), Cheap at Half the Price, Killing …
The Fred Records Story Vol. 3 - Stepping Out
Third of a three box collection by one of the most innovative guitarists and composers of his generation, containing eight ReR CDs, a bonus Fred title and a fat historic booklet with artwork, photographs, extensive notes and other comments by Fred, all packed into in a sturdy box -- and at a budget price. Box three contains: Technology of Tears, Propaganda, Allies, Accidental, The Previous Evening, Happy End Problem, Nowhere, Sideshow, Field Days. Plus, bonus CD Inimitable (previously unreleased…
The Fred Records Story Vol. 2 - Crossing Borders
Second of a three-box collection by one of the most innovative guitarists and composers of his generation, containing 8 ReR CDs, a bonus Fred title and a fat historic booklet with artwork, photographs, extensive notes & other comments by Fred, all packed into in a sturdy box -- and at a budget price. Box 2 contains: Live in Japan, Speechless, Prints, Step Across the Border (film score), Impur 2 (large ensemble), Art of Memory II (with John Zorn), Skeleton Crew (double CD with Zeena Parkins and T…
The Fred Records Story Vol. 1 - Rocking The Boat
First of a three-box collection by one of the most innovative guitarists and composers of his generation, containing 8 ReR CDs, plus a bonus Fred title & a fat historic booklet with artwork, photographs, extensive notes and other comments by Fred, all packed into in a sturdy box -- and at a budget price. Box one contains: The legendary Guitar Solos, Gravity (with Etron Fou Leloublan and Samla Mammas Manna), Cheap at Half the Price, Killing Time (with Bill Laswell and Fred Maher), Impur (for very…