Excerpts from sleeve notes:
Chance! With all respects to the memory of John Cage, it's not really what the music included on this CD is about. Rather a matter of co-operative understanding of living the music, genuine individual statements related to the group's music with an almost telepathic co-ordination of their four independent voices.
It sounds great not only because they are fine players/soloists (Evan's sound on tenor sax is marvellous here, and Rutherford has a truly unique London accent), but rather due to the care and sensitiveness with which they "speak together" following the tacit imaginary path of the performance… a sense of manipulation of time and space… this feeling of relaxation… the melodic motive which Evan and Paul R. shared spontaneously and came back here and there…
I'm not giving the details about the festival where this gig took place (at a time when this sort of music went "out of fashion" among media, concert organisers and record producers). Only one thing! The inside of the room was clothed with black curtains in order to modify its acoustics (mainly echoic). A sort of tent which covered the +/-200 square metres of the place due to the expert stage management of recording engineer Michael W. Houn. They played the last gig of the day at midnight.
So here you have the columns of air of Evan Parker and Paul Rutherford 13 years ago, with the "old kit" of Paul Lytton (Chinese drums, Dexion rack, old telephonist's mike, etc… somewhat simplified if you compare the mad set-up of the 70s) and the quiet Hans Schneider replacing Barry Guy (who was unavailable) on a dry acoustic bass. Hans was a frequent collaborator with Lytton in groups with reedists Wolfgang Fuchs and Floris Floridis. His remarkable job here puts this Parker aggregation in another light, as do the passages of restraint and silence from the percussion chair. For me, a moment of truth in succeeding in improvising music together. I would like to thank them again for their total involvement in performing this gig. |