English Music”: Contributors’ Notes

LMJ 11 CD COMPANION Not Necessarily “English Music”: Contributors’ Notes

WIND FLUTES URBAN (1975) Cambridge. The group approach centered around live elec- Sound sculptures constructed by Max Eastley tronic treatment of instruments, with tape and amplification Note by Max Eastley, c/o David Toop, 7 Topsfield Road, Lon- also playing important roles. Their work covered the com- don N8 8SN, U.K. plete range of notated and improvised music. Inter- modulation performed regularly throughout Britain, in- In July 1975 I made a set of three Aeolian flutes. I had not cluding three performances at the BBC Proms (1970, 1971 heard them sounding, as there was little or no wind on the and 1974) and an Arts Council Contemporary Music Net- day they were finished. work Tour in 1975. However, I remembered that the Aeolian harp can be fitted They also worked with Stockhausen, for example as part of into a sashcord window by closing the window to just above Sternklang, which they recorded under the composer’s direc- the strings and allowing a draught to be created by opening tion. The group’s final concert was in February 1976. other windows in the house. My studio had such a window, so Further information and discussion of Intermodulation’s I arranged the flutes in a similar way and waited. Night came work may be found in Tim Souster, “Intermodulation: A and everything was hot and still. Short History,” Contact 17 (Summer 1977) pp. 3–6; and At that time my studio was in the house where I lived. The Simon Emmerson, “Live Electronic Music in Britain: Three bedroom was across the landing. The next morning, in that Case Studies,” Contemporary Music Review 6, Part 1 (1991) pp. half-waking state between dream and deep sleep, I heard 179–195. something. Then there was silence. It was like hearing a wisp Acknowledgment of smoke that vanished into darkness. Then again, it was flow- ing like water, stopping, increasing, waiting, a thing that was The recording and this note were prepared by Simon Emmerson with thanks to Penny Souster and Peter Britton. alive. As my hearing left the dream world, I opened my eyes. Seeing the familiar room in the half-dark dawn light, I knew that the flutes were sounding. I lay listening to them, to a WEDGED INTO RELEASE (1971) sound I had never heard before. Composer/performer: Frank Perry (percussion) A little later I realized that this sound would not last for- Blowin’ in the Wind (1971) ever, so I got up, went to the studio and set up my recording Performers: Frank Perry (drums), Mongezi Feza (trumpet), equipment. As the light became stronger, the dawn chorus of Chris McGregor (piano) starlings, blackbirds and sparrows became louder. The cur- Note by Frank Perry, 3 Drake Close, Ringwood, Hampshire, tains moved gracefully, like weeds in waters, mirroring this BH224 1UG, U.K. unearthly music. When I hear this recording now, I realize that this is not just a unique event in musical terms for me, Until February 1969 I had been drumming in a band called but also it poignantly highlights the tragedy that such dawn Black Cat Bones, a Chicago-style blues band with the late Paul choruses of birds in London can’t be heard anymore. Kossoff (guitarist with Free) playing lead guitar, but my jazz techniques finally got the better of me. I opted for jazz. How- PERFORMANTS (1971) ever, my introduction came from Mike Sullivan (alto sax) who was an ardent follower of the Spontaneous Music Ensemble Performers: Intermodulation—Roger Smalley, Tim Souster, (SME). So I went straight into avant-garde jazz. We formed a Robin Thompson, Peter Britton trio with George Jensen (a bassist friend of mine) called Mu- Note by Simon Emmerson, Music Department, City University, sicians Union and began playing free-form group improvised London EC1V OHB, U.K. E-mail: . music in March 1968. I’d been playing drums for 4 years. I also joined Mike in attending the Little Theatre Club every The original programme note reads: Friday and Saturday evening for over a year. It often hap- This type of group composition has grown up out of a need pened that after the gig the whole audience (fans) went with for the group to find consistency of style. The danger of pre- John Stevens to Ronnie Scott’s or 100 Club, etc. John would conceived ideas upsetting the balance of live improvisation, waltz up and say, “They’re all with me,” and we’d all get in has to be overcome. free. John would make somewhat derisive comments regard- Intermodulation has recently been working on live manipu- ing the music—it was true that what he was doing was more lation of formants (a term used in acoustics to describe over- original, new and very different. Mike particularly liked tone structures) in attempts to develop an instrumental type SME’s intense listening style. of playing but with a flexibility comparable to that of singing. By October of 1968 I’d had to move out of London to The original performance lasted 14'15", of which the track Mildenhall in Suffolk with my parents. After a while, I’d go on the LMJ11 CD edits together two extracts totaling 6'42". down to London on weekends either to listen to SME or to Intermodulation was founded by Roger Smalley and Tim play on the scene (at Peanuts—a club run by Harry Miller at Souster in 1969, while both were based at Kings College, a pub just over the road from Stockwell tube station) with

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