AMM
AMM music is supposed to admit all sounds but the members of AMM have marked preferences. An open-ness to the totality of sounds implies a tendency away from traditional musical structures towards informality. Governing this tendency -reining it in- are various thoroughly traditional musical structures such as saxophone, piano, violin, guitar, etc., in each of which reposes a portion of the history of music. Further echoes of the history of music enter through the medium of the transistor radio (the use of which as a musical instrument was pioneered by John Cage)” Cornelius Cardew, Towards an Ethics of Improvisation
AMM music is supposed to admit all sounds but the members of AMM have marked preferences. An open-ness to the totality of sounds implies a tendency away from traditional musical structures towards informality. Governing this tendency -reining it in- are various thoroughly traditional musical structures such as saxophone, piano, violin, guitar, etc., in each of which reposes a portion of the history of music. Further echoes of the history of music enter through the medium of the transistor radio (the use of which as a musical instrument was pioneered by John Cage)” Cornelius Cardew, Towards an Ethics of Improvisation
Member of: Eddie Prévost
Trinity
The amorphous unit that is AMM has been refining—and indeed redefining—a sound for as long as it's been in existence, and there's no reason to believe that the process this implies is likely to ever stop evolving. This does of course render John Butcher's presence here as perhaps anomalous, but there are no musical reasons to believe that this was the case in reality. The resulting trio—indeed the Trinity—of Butcher on tenor and soprano saxophones, pianist John Tilbury and percussionist
Eddie P…
Grand Tour
Tilbury left communist Poland in 1964 and his visits grew rare. He got involved with Cornelius Cardew’s Scrath Orchestra and the AMM; later he went on to become known for his performances of Morton Feldman’s compositions. Meanwhile Zygmunt Krauze, aside from his work in the Musical Workshop, grew to be his generation’s leading conceptual composer, mainly thanks to his reception of Wladyslaw Strzeminnski’s unism. The worlds of Krauze and Tilbury were separate, but adjacent.
The Musical Worksh…
Playing with a Dead Person
When you contacted me about the duos, I thought there is nothing more original than playing with a dead person […] which is curious because Derek Bailey is very much alive, especially when we hear his voice and I feel he's sort of sitting here, in the studio, and he's waiting for me and I'm waiting for him and we're not quite sure what's gonna happen. „Derek and I always wanted to do a duo recording together and we never quite managed that. Within the later years that we were trying to set somet…
Supersession
Recorded at a concert in London, September 1984, this supersession brings AMM stalwarts Keith Rowe and Eddie Prevost together with saxophonist Evan Parker and bassist Barry Guy for an amazingly diverse and cohesive long improvisation.
"Eddie Prévost is not only a highly articulate percussionist but also a stimulating writer, writing for example his occasional contributions to The Write Place or his examnation and critical reactions to The Ganelin Trio in Wire 7. This CD release from Prévos…
Beyond the Barrier
Superb free improvisation from the UK trio of Nathaniel Catchpole on tenor sax, John Edwards on double bass, and Eddie Prevost on drums and bowed tam-tam, three generations of improvisers pushing the envelope of spontaneous composition in accomplished and playful dialog. "
Nothing changes. However, how do we initiate or revive a sense of investigation? How do we push beyond the merely presentational? Market acceptability is surely a too limited artistic objective. Maybe, no objective a…
Spanish Fighters
Recorded at the festival Neposlusno (Sound Disobedience) in Ljubljana, Slovenia in 2012, the AMM duo of Eddie Prevost on percussion and John Tilbury on piano perform an extend improvisation of tension and dynamic, delicately balancing sound in a rich dialog. Incidentally, the title of the album is the name of the venue (Spanski Borci in which the concert was recorded. Both artists felt a certain respect playing in a place with references to the Spanish Civil War and the fascism that prevailed in…
About enough still not to know
Enough still not to know is a 4 CD box set with music by John Tilbury and Keith Rowe, produced by visual artist Kjell Bjørgeengen for an upcoming video installation. The music is improvised, but it is quite evident that the two artists have developed a strong understanding throughout their five-decade long collaboration.
Keith Rowe and John Tilbury are especially known from their work in the Scratch Orchestra and AMM with Cornelius Cardew. Tilbury is also known as one of the foremost interp…
Timekeepers
ten years after their "variety" cd a-musik present the brilliant second release by John Tilbury (piano) and Marcus Schmickler (computer). Recorded in january 2012 at Loft, Köln, mixed in december 2014 at piethopraxis.
Acoustic Trio
Acoustic trio with John Coxon [acoustic guitars] Ashley Wales [found percussion etc.] and AMM's Eddie Prevost. A slowly evolving and spacious piece originating from reading eddie's book 'minute particulars'. "I have a National Trojan guitar from the 1930s that i bought in a little shop in new orleans. I used this for the ‘acoustic trio’ recording with Ashley Wales and Eddie Prevost [amongst many other recordings]. I remember Eddie saying ‘the perfect instrument’ because it has both a membrane an…
Bishopsgate Concert
Recorded at Bishopsgate Institute, London 14/11/2012 "John Tilbury solo using two pianos-one prepared,the other not, the former being the famous old piano which once belonged to to Myra Hess. Ishmael Wadada Leo Smith solo accompanied by the spectral sound of sympathetic strings from John Tilbury's prepared piano,followed by a long and utterly absorbing duo from these two masterful musicians.
Two pianos and other pieces, 1953-1969
A double CD of music for multiple pianos from what is arguably the most experimental and interesting period of Morton Feldman's development as a composer. Some of the pieces have been very rarely performed or recorded, and have probably never been in better hands. The music featured on these two discs testifies to the intensity of Feldman's experimentation with notation and sound during the 1950s and 60s. Considering the works chronologically one senses the composer trying out, teasing and deve…
All Change
Recorded in concert at The Network Theatre, Waterloo in London, 2012, the trio of Tom Chant on saxophone, John Edwards on bass and Eddie Prevost on drums present a tour de force of modern free jazz with great technical and conversational power.
Contour
Weird recording for Mikroton featuring a duo recording of Keith Rowe and Alfredo Costa Monteiro and a quartet recording of them with Ilia Belorukov and Kurt Liedwart, two recordings made at the same day at spina!studio in St. Petersburg during Teni Zvuka 2013 festival.
Keith Rowe is mainly known as the pivotal and crucial musician standing in the forefront of the first wave of the European free improvisation, co-founder of AMM in 1965 and inventor of tabletop guitar playing techniques whic…
Place Sub. V.
Active since the mid-1960s, England's AMM have become an icon of the free improvisational movement. In the spring of 2004, due to personal and philosophical disagreements, Keith Rowe suspended his involvement with AMM, an association that went back to his role as founding member in 1965 (albeit with an almost decade-long disenfranchisement through the '70s). The remaining members, percussionist Eddie Prévost and pianist John Tilbury, elected to continue on as AMM, and this their latest effort. T…
Live at I-and-E
This is a long-awaited re-issue, unavailable since 2006. The duo had formed the previous year for ErstQuake in NYC and this was to be their second and, as yet, only other performance together. The breadth and depth of [the] music is totally inspiring, I absolutely love this piece of music. Total unity in sound to make a perfect piece in the moment. It doesn't get better than this! (Gordon W. Smith)
Keith Rowe and Mark Wastell. This last performance balanced the evening well. Louder, more gestura…
The Just Reproach
The Just Reproach documents the second concert given by John Tilbury and Oren Ambarchi as a duo. When they first performed together in Reykjavik, Iceland in March 2012, the aptness of the pairing was evident. When they reprised the duo at London's Cafe OTO in September the same year in the concert presented here, the city was in the midst of a heatwave. With the air-conditioning turned off to accommodate the low volume of the performance, the uncomfortable squirming of the audience members…
Tri-Borough Triptych
Hearing Evan Parker make music with Eddie Prévost, on the first of these three lengthy duets recorded in three different London boroughs, is like watching a pair of tai chi masters sparring. Parker’s tenor and Prévost’s bowed and struck percussion draw buoyancy from each other’s energy as they alternately push and yield. Together they move with feline lightness, agility and balance, even when the music’s mood is stormy and turbulent. The event was Freedom Of The City 2012; the venue, Ceci…
Exta
Finally restocked! "Butcher’s sax ranges from soft, whispery purrs to teeth-chatteringly spiteful blasts. Lehn’s analogue synth leaps in a moment from burbling tones to fiercely sizzling abstraction, and Tilbury slips from his familiar melodic interludes and fragmented arpeggios to crashing, seismic attacks on the inside of the piano. What sets this album head and shoulders above similar offerings is the understanding between the trio. It’s not just the way all three move together as one from su…
Meetings With Remarkable Saxophonists - Volume 3
Jason Yarde, alto and soprano saxophones. Oli Hayhurst, double bass. Eddie Prévost, drums. Recorded at Network Theatre, Waterloo, London on 7th August 2011. "The real discovery is Jason Yarde, and to come in a series after Evan Parker and John Butcher says enough about the esteem Prévost has for the young musician. The quality is obvious. He can shout and scream full of relentless energy, exploring new sonic environments and alternating with very lyrical and calm passages, with phrases and…
Meetings With Remarkable Saxophonists - Volume 4
The fourth volume of Eddie Prevost's 2011 series of concerts at Network Theatre, Waterloo, London meeting with remarkable saxophonists, here with Bertrand Denzler, tenor saxophone, John Edwards, double bass, Eddie Prévost, drums. Recorded at The Network Theatre, Waterloo, on the 12th December 2011. Special thanks to the theatrical custodians of The Network Theatre and especially Keith Wait - for being so positively disposed for this series. Recorded by Giovanni La Rovere. Mixed and edited by Joh…