Fred Frith/Zeena Parkins/Ikue Mori

Ikue Mori (electronics), Zeena Parkins (electric harp), and legendary guitarist Fred Frith are international icons of modern improvisation. These frequent collaborators have performed together since the 80s, earning widespread acclaim for their innovative experimentation with musical forms, techniques and instruments. Parkins and Mori’s duo CD Phantom Orchard, was hailed by critics as “beautiful and dangerous” and “a joy to experience.” Their appearance with Frith is the first time these frequent collaborators will perform together in the Northwest.

Fred Frith, self-taught electric guitarist, is heralded as one of the most influential avant-garde musicians of our time. His alternative use of both traditional and unlikely instruments elaborates on free jazz experimental and accidental improvisation. Native to England, he now teaches and lives in Oakland, California. Zeena Parkins is considered a pioneer of the electric harp for her inventive use of unusual playing techniques, preparations, and layers of digital and analog processing. She has toured with Bjork, Yoko Ono, and John Zorn and was a member of Skeleton Crew with Fred Frith and Tom Cora between 1984 and 1986. Ikue Mori’s sonorous reverberations are the product of her evolution from the standard drum set to strictly laptop percussion. Native to Tokyo, she now lives in New York and is at the forefront of the downtown electronic scene.

Fred Firth
Zeena Parkins
Ikue Mori

There is never one way to do something...In music you have to be constantly ready to change your mind, and constantly alert to the possibility of a change of direction Fred Frith