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The Topography of the Lungs
The Topography of the Lungs is finally re-issued. A landmark album in the British avant garde – the first record ever on Incus Records (originally released in 1970) and a monumental set of improvisations between Parker, Bailey, and Bennink, considered by many to be a key recording in the history of improvised music, it brought together three musicians who then continued to develop the genre in the intervening three decades:EVAN PARKER (soprano & tenor saxophones), DEREK BAILEY (guitar) and HAN…
Trance Map
Evan Parker (soprano saxophone, sample collection, co-composition), Matthew Wright (live sampling, turntables, co-composition and sound design). In which the studio becomes the arena for an expanded method of improvisation where successive layers of sound making are built up, revised, scrapped, edited, revisited... (As the notes say 'the tweaks went down to the wire.') In short, the way many musicians have been working for decades, but a new experience for a hard-core, real-time free improviser …
Beauvais cathedral
The long-awaited reissue of KENT CARTER's highly-acclaimed first solo album. As well as some solo cello and double bass improvisations, there are some collages in which he plays nearly all the parts himself courtesy of over-dubbing techniques. Carter had previously been heard with the groups of Paul Bley and Steve Lacy (among others), but such work did not prepare one for the unique music heard in this collection. Three previously unissued items (including a one-man string quartet) have been add…
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"Concert and studio recordings of peace music organised by John Stevens for himself and Trevor Watts with numerous workshop musicians and audience people on saxophones, percussion and voices mostly contributing a flexible drone. Only Stevens could have organised music as outrageous as this - must be heard to be believed. Reissue of the major work of A 001 with an additional similar piece." (Emanem)
Frameworks
Three different groups in performances utilising frameworks devised by John Stevens sending the music into unexpected areas. From mid-1968 there is the unusual line-up of JOHN STEVENS (percussion), NORMA WINSTONE (voice), KENNY WHEELER (fluegelhorn), PAUL RUTHERFORD (trombone) and TREVOR WATTS (bass clarinet) in a wide-ranging half-hour sequence. Another half-hour sequence features the superb 1971 quartet of STEVENS (percussion & voice), JULIE TIPPETT (voice & guitar), WATTS (soprano sax) and RO…
1968
An expanded reissue of the only published recording by one of the pioneering free improvisation groups, The People Band's self-titled album, originally released in 1970. Containing musicians that also worked with Pete Brown, Mike Westbrook, Ian Dury, Soft Machine, and others, this musical collective coalesced in London in 1968, and soon came to the attention of jazz aficionado Charlie Watts, who financed and oversaw a recording session that October. Improvised, anarchic, and utterly original, …
Bare Essentials 1972-3
A definite set of bare essentials from the Spontaneous Music Ensemble – especially given that at this point, the group was stripped down to just the duo of John Stevens on percussion and cornet, and Trevor Watts on soprano sax! The material was all recorded live, and the double-length set is an amazing illustration of the genius that Stevens brought to the group – a way of working and reworking a very simple concept – such that the freedom of improvisation was also given a structure, yet …
Last Tour
Steve Lacy (soprano saxophone), Irene Aebi (voice), George Lewis (trombone), Jean-Jacques Avenel (double bass) and John Betsch (drums). After a long tour of North America, this quintet concluded by playing two concerts in Boston (March 2004) - most of the first one being included here. The material is five of the Beat poems featuring Irene Aebi, plus three instrumentals, including one (Baghdad) that has not been on record before as it had only just been written. After a lot of working together, …
Withdrawal (1966/67)
Featuring the earliest published recordings of Barry Guy & Evan Parker, percussionist John Steven's presents transitional sextet and septet performances of his groundbreaking free improv group from 1966 & '67 with Trevor Watts, Paul Rutherford, Kenny Wheeler, and Derek Bailey.
"Here is a missing link between the first two Spontaneous Music Ensemble (SME) recordings to be published. The music on CHALLENGE (recorded 1966 March and issued on a long vanished Eyemark LP) is mainly free jazz, w…
69/70
Following on from their only prior published recording ('1968' reissued on Emanem 4102), here are over two hours of previously unissued recordings from 1969 and 1970, featuring: Mel Davis, Terry Day, Lynn Dobson, Eddie Edem, Tony Edwards, Mike Figgis, Russell Hardy, Adam Hart, Charlie Hart, Terry Holman, Iain Jacobs, Paul Jolly, George Khan, Albert Kovitz, Michael O'Dwyer (Spoon), Davey Payne, Butch Potter, Geoffrey Prowse & Rose Widdison. Very different musics recorded in four very different lo…
South on the Northern
Two concerts from an eight-year gap in the published recordings of the Iskra 1903 trio of Paul Rutherford (trombone), Philipp Wachsmann (violin & electronics) and Barry Guy (bass & electronics), masterful improvisation blending acoustics and electronics.
Oliv & Familie
The 1969 Oliv session was the third Spontaneous Music Ensemble LP to be issued, following on from Challenge (1966) and Karyobin (1968), currently awaiting reissue. Familie appears to be the earliest recorded example of a large Sme group. This music is very influenced by slow-moving Gagaku (Japanese court music), especially the semi-composed first half. The second half is largely a free improvisation with a brief return to the written material at the end. An alternative take was recorded, presuma…
First Duo Concert (London 1974)
Their earliest meeting on record - the complete London (Wigmore Hall) concert (organised by Emanem), featuring them both at the top of their form. Highly acclaimed by both enthusiasts and critics. Reissue of 4006 which contained the concert section of Emanem 601. "These twelve duets between African-American avant-gardist Anthony Braxton and Brit Derek Bailey are remarkable for several reasons, not the least of which is that this is the first recording of these two seminal figures performing in t…
New surfacing
"Two recordings from the beginning and the end of the longest-lived version of the SME - the trio of John Stevens (percussion, cornet or mini-trumpet, voice), Nigel Coombes (violin) & Roger Smith (guitar). The 1978 Newcastle concert was considered by the musicians and others to be the best performance by the trio, while the 1992 studio is also very fine."-EmanemExcerpts from sleeve notes written by Martin Davidson: "This release containing recordings from 1978 and 1992 could be subtitled t…
Challenge
Available again SME reveals their free jazz roots with only hints of what was to come. "Pure pleasure is the way one might react to this glorious recording, which lays the foundation for Spontaneous Music Ensemble's more radical works to come. In part a product of its time, these tracks are much more in the vein of free jazz than the abstract free improvisational style that came to characterize the group. On Challenge, the lineage can easily be traced directly to the innovations of George R…
Avignon and after - Volume 1
The 1972 Avignon concerts were Steve Lacy’s very first solo concerts, although he did make an excellent overdubbed solo record for Saravah the year before. (For ‘solo’ read ‘alone’ or ‘unaccompanied’ rather than the usual music business meaning of ‘very accompanied’.) Thanks to an introduction by John Stevens, I first met Lacy when he visited London in 1973. He brought with him some of the Avignon tapes in order to try and interest a record producer to issue this music. However, record producers…
The Sun
It is a disturbing fact that most of the major disputes throughout history have been settled by physical fighting involving killing. Have we really risen much above the rest of the animal world? On the contrary, many animals do not kill members of their own species even though they may fight. It used to be that battles were fought in a remote location between two armies that comprised a small percentage of the population. But let us not forget that military fighters, whether voluntary, conscript…
School days
“In 1962 I went to New York for the first time. My father had worked for Boac for so long that the flights were free - I had only to pay 7/6 (=37½p) airport tax. I stayed in NY for two weeks, only leaving Manhattan to take the standard tourist boat trip around the island. A lady on the plane had taken an interest in my plans, and when I told her that I didn't think there would be time to experience more than what Manhattan had to offer, she implored me, 'Please don't judge America by what you se…
Free for a Minute (1966-72) 2CD
An incredible package – one that brings together two very important albums from reedman Steve Lacy – plus unreleased material from the same time too! First up is the record Disposability – presented here with the first-ever correction to the cymbal sound – a key session in the development of Steve Lacy – and a great one too! The album was one of Lacy's first European recordings – caught in the studio in Rome in 1965, with a very free-styled trio that includes Alberto Romano on drums and Kent Car…
Chapter one: 1970 -72
Much needed reissue of Emanem 4301, a classic concert and studio performances from '70-'72 by the innovative trio of Paul Rutherford (trombone, piano) Derek Bailey (guitar) and Barry Guy (double bass), which was a much expanded reissue of the early and legendary Incus LP of the same name. "What a feast! A three-CD set (totaling more than 190 minutes) compiled from six concerts featuring three of the leading British free-jazz improvisers of the 20th century: trombonist Paul Rutherford, guitarist …