Strings With Evan Parker (2001)

At the start of 1997, Evan Parker invited 23 musicians into the studio to record some large and medium scale improvisations. The most focused result was a performance by the strings with some electronics, heard here as Flying Spark.

A year later, this inspired Parker to just invite string players, some of whom use electronics, to a recording session. The session resulted in about two and a half hours of magnificent music, all of which is heard here in the order of performance. (Less than one minute of music has been edited out.)

Having invited these performers into the studio, Parker basically just let them get on and make music. The results were so good that he did not join in until towards the end of the session. After the first five improvisations, he asked the ensemble for a piece to be used as an accompaniment for an overdubbed saxophone solo. Two and a half years later he did overdub the ensuing piece, and the end result is Double Headed Serpent. Since the original piece is also very fine (and quite different) in its own right, it is also included without the overdubbing as Single Headed Serpent.

Following this extended dense drone-like piece, there was a complete contrast with two short, plucked group improvisations and a bowed one. After this, each member of the ensemble chose a subset of four to six players, resulting in the Sub-Groups. Some of these included Parker playing for the first time that day. The final and longest piece of the day - The Spider's Web - was the only time all ten musicians performed together.

The performances show the influences of both of the great English traditions of group improvisation - those of AMM and SME. Evan Parker had been a member of the Spontaneous Music Ensemble in 1967 when the SME method was first put into practice; but he has also been an admirer of AMM since his first exposure to them around the same time, and has been invited to guest with them occasionally in the intervening years. Starting with his work with the Music Improvisation Company in 1968, he has been involved in exploring ways of combining the AMM and SME methods. By now, these two methods, and the ways to combine them, are 'in the air' - lingua franca to most improvisers on the scene, as can be heard here. Martin Davidson (2001)

DISC A
1. The Sitting on the Roof Series 1
2. The Sitting on the Roof Series 2
3. The Sitting on the Roof Series 3
4. Laughing in the House
5. Another Fire Drill
6. Double Headed Serpent

DISC B
1. The Ghost Series 1: (Pizzicato)
2. The Ghost Series 2: (Pizzicato)
3. The Ghost Series 3: (Arco)
4. Sub-Group Marcio Mattos 1
5. Sub-Group Marcio Mattos 2
6. Sub-Group Rhodri Davies
7. Sub-Group Mark Wastell
8. Sub-Group Peter Cusack
9. Sub-Group Phil Durrant
10. Sub-Group Hugh Davies
11. Sub-Group John Russell
12. Sub-Group John Edwards
13. Sub-Group Kaffe Matthews

DISC C
1. The Spider’s Web
2. Single Headed Serpent
3. Flying Spark

PHIL DURRANT: violin
KAFFE MATTHEWS: violin & electronics
MARCIO MATTOS: cello
MARK WASTELL: cello (except C3)
JOHN EDWARDS: double bass
RHODRI DAVIES: harp
PETER CUSACK: bouzouki, guitar & electronics
JOHN RUSSELL: guitar
HUGH DAVIES: strings, springs & electronics (except C3)
SUSANA FERRAR: violin (C3 only)
PHILIPP WACHSMANN: violin (C3 only)
EVAN PARKER: soprano saxophone (A6, B10-B13 & C1 only)

All recorded in London, 4/1/1998 (except C3, 10/1/1997)
Evan Parker was overdubbed on A6 (5/7/2000). C2 is the same piece without overdubbing.
Released by Emanem in 2001.

disc a :: disc b :: disc c @320