French Gigs

Portions of this set come from a short 1978 tour in the period shortly after Fred Frith's longtime progressive rock combo Henry Cow had run out of milk and talented multi-instrumentalist/composer Frith was stressing out about the insecurities of undertaking a solo career. The entire first side of the album originates a few years later, when the duo reconvened for a surprise gig in Reims. In between, Frith had relocated to New York City and was well under way along the aforementioned path as freelance solo artist. In both cases the playing is superb, the time gap between the performances becoming the type of reality that fades away magically when improvisers of this quality take the stage. Coxhill's tone is like no other soprano saxophonist, other than Sidney Bechet. Both men have the ability to use the small horn as a kind of conjuring wand, bringing to mind an apple tart with one note and a truck scraping the side of the wall with another. Unlike Bechet, Coxhill is comfortable playing in contexts far removed from traditional jazz, although he brings in stylistic assets from this genre such as humor, sentimentality, and swing. Using his tabletop guitar setup, Frith provides a magnificent sort of orchestral accompaniment. He also does well producing the collection, avoiding the temptation to chop up the flowing improvisations in order to come up with an album of meaningless highlights. If anything, the longer playing time of a CD might have allowed even more music to be presented, and perhaps someday these recordings will be revisited for a reissue with that in mind. ~ Eugene Chadbourne