Evan Parker
Fourth Portal
Fourth Portal Lab @ St Andrew's Art Centre 19 Royal Pier Road
Feb 18, 2024
4:00 PM GMT
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Innovation is not exclusive to engineering or changing social or work spheres; it comes in many forms, including innovation in how to play an instrument.
The Fourth Portal is proud to welcome another British music legend, saxophonist Evan Parker.
"Few musicians have influenced solo improvisation as Evan Parker has, from the adaptation of circular breathing to the vast exploration of his instruments? potential for harmonics, quarter tones and apparent polyphony." (Stu Broomer, The Free Jazz Collective)
CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS: £9 Advance | £6 Concessions | £12 On the Door
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British tenor and soprano saxophone player Evan Parker has been a consistently innovative presence in British free music since the 1960s.
Though he has worked extensively in both large and small ensembles, Parker is perhaps best known for his solo soprano saxophone music, a singular body of work that in recent years has centred around his continuing exploration of techniques such as circular breathing, double tonguing, multiphonics and cross-fingering. These are technical devices, yet Parker's use of them is, he says, less analytical than intuitive; he has likened performing his solo work to entering a kind of trance state. The resulting music is certainly hypnotic, an uninterrupted flow of snaky, densely textured sound that Parker has described as "the illusion of polyphony". Many listeners have indeed found it hard to credit that one man can create such intricate, complex music in real-time. (Cafe OTO).
Parker has recorded a large number of albums both solo or as a group leader and has recorded or performed with Peter Brötzmann, Michael Nyman, John Stevens, Derek Bailey, Keith Rowe, Joe McPhee, Anthony Braxton, Cecil Taylor, John Zorn, Fred Frith, Ikue Mori, Thurston Moore, Milford Graves, George E. Lewis, Tim Berne, Mark Dresser, Dave Holland, Sylvie Courvoisier, and many others.
Full Bio: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evan_Parker
CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS: £9 Advance | £6 Concessions | £12 On the Door
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Evan Parker Biography
Evan Parker (born 5 April 1944 in Bristol) is a British free-improvising saxophone player.
His original inspiration was Paul Desmond, and in recent years the influence of cool jazz saxophone players has again become apparent in his music — there are tributes to Warne Marsh and Lee Konitz on Time Will Tell (ECM, 1993) and Chicago Solo (Okkadisk, 1997).
However, Parker is probably better known for his 1960s work, which rapidly assimilated the American avantgarde — John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, Albert Ayler and others — and forged his own, instantly identifiable style. His music of the 1960s and 1970s is harsh, raw and unsettling, involving fluttering, swirling lines that have shape rather than tangible melodic content; sometimes he makes use of pure sound in a manner that recalls Steve Lacy's more radical 1970s recordings or the work of some AACM members. He began to develop methods of rapidly layering harmonics and false notes to create dense contrapuntal weaves; these involved experiments with plastic reeds and rapid tonguing which initially were so intense that he would find blood dripping onto the floor from the saxophone.
Parker is one of the few saxophone players for whom unaccompanied solo performance is a major part of his work. One critic has written that Parker's solo performances "reveal also the mechanical possibilities for the instrument that weren't even considered before he came along — things like playing in all three registers of the instrument at the same time."
Read MoreHis original inspiration was Paul Desmond, and in recent years the influence of cool jazz saxophone players has again become apparent in his music — there are tributes to Warne Marsh and Lee Konitz on Time Will Tell (ECM, 1993) and Chicago Solo (Okkadisk, 1997).
However, Parker is probably better known for his 1960s work, which rapidly assimilated the American avantgarde — John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, Albert Ayler and others — and forged his own, instantly identifiable style. His music of the 1960s and 1970s is harsh, raw and unsettling, involving fluttering, swirling lines that have shape rather than tangible melodic content; sometimes he makes use of pure sound in a manner that recalls Steve Lacy's more radical 1970s recordings or the work of some AACM members. He began to develop methods of rapidly layering harmonics and false notes to create dense contrapuntal weaves; these involved experiments with plastic reeds and rapid tonguing which initially were so intense that he would find blood dripping onto the floor from the saxophone.
Parker is one of the few saxophone players for whom unaccompanied solo performance is a major part of his work. One critic has written that Parker's solo performances "reveal also the mechanical possibilities for the instrument that weren't even considered before he came along — things like playing in all three registers of the instrument at the same time."
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