LANTSKAP LOGIG TRIO
with evelyn davis and fred frith
HISTORY
Fred and I had been playing duo for a while and after our show at the Great American Music Hall, where we explored the possibilities of drone music, he suggested we get together and do some recording with Evelyn. We set up at the chapel on the Mills College Campus, which has a lovely pipe organ. As it happens, Evelyn has a deep relationship with this amazing instrument. The recording was captured by Karen Stackpole and was released by Clean Feed in December 2018. We were all really knocked out by what we did that night and have continued to play in trio around the Bay Area, where Evelyn has worked with prepared piano. She is a master of this technique and it gives us so much room to explore new territories. It is a one of a kind experience to work in trio with these two amazing individuals.
LANTSKAP LOGIC - ONE
REVIEW from In On The Corner ...
"When one considers a trio of pipe organ, electric guitar, and saxophone, the initial expectation is not likely, “a minimal, dark-ambient masterpiece!” Alas, here we are with Lantskap Logic. Lovingly recorded in the chapel at Mills College in Oakland, California, Evelyn Davis, Fred Frith, and Phillip Greenlief deliver one of the most mesmerizing documents of improvised music in recent memory.
As the all-purpose group name might suggest, this was an ad hoc meeting, presumably executed with little or no preparation. This is all the more impressive considering the almost alien subtlety and responsiveness of the performances of Davis, Frith, and Greenlief: at times it’s impossible to discern three distinct instruments within the drone they are so in sync. Also, there is something about hearing music in a sacred space, performed by true masters, that is deeply affecting, and even through the medium of hi-res digital files, this is the present case. It is only at the tail end of LL, as sirens sound in the streets, that the spell is broken.
LL has transcendence in spades and I know I am not alone when I say, at the risk of sounding greedy, I could use another two hours of this asap."
LANTSKAP LOGIC - TWO
LANTSKAP LOGIC - HIDDEN DANGER LETS ME IN
In 2022, almost ten years after recording the first Lantskap Logic album, the situation in Oakland had abruptly changed. Mills College was being sold off, and the music department— internationally renowned as a beacon of experimentalism for more than 70 years – would no longer exist. I had retired from teaching at Mills in 2018, Evelyn completed her graduate studies in 2013 and also taught there, and Mills is deeply ingrained in our DNA. As a long time Bay Area resident, and collaborator with dozens of other Mills alums, Phillip is no different. Knowing that our access to the Mills Chapel would no longer be guaranteed, I proposed a second round of Lantskap Logic recordings, since the Chapel pipe organ is intrinsic to our existence. This duly came to pass, with the intrepid Karen Stackpole once again providing her services as recording engineer. Whereas the first record had been made in a spirit of open – hearted exploration, this one had a certain focus, an emotional edge, that captures the feeling of the time. I experienced countless concerts and installations in this chapel during my twenty years at Mills, and the ghosts and spirits of many extraordinary and gifted composers and performers haunt that space and resonate beyond it. I hear our music from that day as both a requiem and a call of defiance against the lack of curiosity and imagination inherent in this revolutionary Music Department’s demise.
- Fred Frith
EVELYN DAVIS BIO:
Detroit native and general wanderer Evelyn Davis is an inside/prepared/new music pianist, improvisor, pipe organist, composer, vocalist, synthesist, teacher, songstress, and maker of /participator in oddly shaped musics with an occasional side of performance art.
She is an improviser that has recorded with Phillip Greenlief, Fred Frith, and Michael Zerang, among many other esteemed musicians from Chicago and the SF Bay Area. She has appeared at several prog festivals in Europe, including Rock in Opposition festival in Carmeaux, France, and Different Sounds Festival in Lublin, Poland. Evelyn holds degrees in Jazz from Southwestern Community College, in Composition from Indiana University, and a Master’s degree in Performance and Improvisation from Mills College.
Evelyn created and performed the music of Frankenixon, with the help of guitarist Joe Kiplinger.