European Free Improvisation Pages

Begun in January 1995, EFIP was intended to be a comprehensive information resource for all aspects of the type of music known as European free improvisation. It is updated approximately every two months.

Every effort has been made to check the information on this site as far as possible; in most cases the information has been sourced from the musicians themselves.

• The sad news came in some weeks ago that John Jack had died. I got to know him through Cadillac Distribution and Cadillac Records through which he released recordings by, among others, Stan Tracey, Bobby Wellins, David Murray, Mike Osborne, and Joe Harriott. There's an appreciative obituary by John Fordham in The Guardian of 6 November.
• Loads of stuff this time, including a particularly Polish air. Not Two Records some months ago released an 8CD box of Joëlle Léandre: duos with Mat Maneri, Lauren Newton, Jean-Luc Cappozzo, Fred Frith, Zlatko Kaucic, Evan Parker and Agusti Fernández, a quartet disc with the last three-named, a solo disc, and a disc with Les Diaboliques. A label just added this month is Fundacja Sluchaj [Listen Foundation] whose recent discs include: the 4CD Agustí Fernández @ 60: River tiger fire; City fall by Parker/Trzaska/Edwards/Sanders; Evan Parker & RGG Live @ Alchemia; Barry Guy/Maya Homburger/Zlatko Kaucic Without borders...; The Liquid Trio [Agustí Fernández/Albert Cirera/Ramon Prats] plays Bernoulli; and Dialogues with strings by Trevor Watts/Veryan Weston/Alison Blunt/Hannah Marshall.
• Recently released is another duo by Joëlle Léandre, this time with Phil Minton on Fou Records: Léandre-Minton. Just out on Emanem is a re-issue of the Spontaneous Music Ensemble's Karyobin, remixed and remastered from the original tapes and sounding better than previous issues; also a 2CD set documenting recordings between 1968 and 2005 of the totally unlauded George Khan: Ah!. Sounding Tears is a recent disc by Mat Maneri/Evan Parker/Lucien Ban who toured Europe, incuding the UK in October and Walthamstow Moon ('61 revisited) is a vinyl only release of 300 copies from Evan Parker/John Edwards/John Russell on Byrd Out. Also touring recently have been the ICP Orchestra, celebrating 50 years and Han Bennink at 75; to indicate this significant milestone the new ICP label release is HAN BENninK, a softcover, hand-bound 140-page art book showcasing Han Bennink's visual art. Two recent discs from John Butcher are Last dream of the morning from a trio including John Edwards and Mark Sanders on Relative Pitch, and, on Balance Point Acoustics, The catastrophe of minimalism, another trio alongside Damon Smith and Weasel Walter.
• I've just updated the Corbett vs Dempsey list of recordings, first for some time, with: Vandermark/Gustafsson Verses; Mats Gustafsson Torturing the saxophone; Kowald/Kessler/Lonberg-Holm Flats fixed; Brötzmann/Van Hove/Bennink 1971; Phillip Wilson Esoteric; Hans Reichel Wichlinghauser blues; and Hans Reichel Bonobo. New on Potlatch is Infra, compositions by Pascale Criton; on Umlaut, Im meer from the Simon Rummel Ensemble; and by The Remote Viewers, Last man in Europe.

COPYRIGHT!! I don't want to get heavy with this but the work involved in setting up this site and maintaining it on a regular basis is substantial so copyright in this material rests with me (and contributors). At the same time, I'm happy for the information/files on these pages to be used in any reasonable way. However, this limited use should also acknowledge both me and the musician/label from where much of the data originally arose. Feedback would also be appreciated to know how any of this is being used elsewhere.

Peter Stubley, formerly Assistant Director for Academic Services, University of Sheffield Library.

p[dot]stubley[at]shef[dot]ac[dot]uk