Description
Label Review.
2020 album. Also available on CD.
Our Overview.
Fire! is a Nordic experimental supergroup formed in 2009 by the core trio of Mats Gustafsson (sax), Johan Berthling (bass guitar) and Andreas Werlin (drums) who joined together to develop a fresh approach to improvised music drawing on influences from free jazz, psychedelic rock, and noise. In 2013, the group went massive — cherry-picking 28 members from the Scandinavian jazz, improvisation, and avant-garde rock music scene to supplement the core band’s sound for a concert at Stockholm’s legendary Fylkingen venue which resulted in the first Fire! Orchestra record ‘Exit!’.
‘Actions For Free Jazz Orchestra’ was written by the Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki in 1971. This new, extended reading by Mats Gustafsson and Fire! Orchestra was commissioned by the Sacrum Profanum festival in Krakow, Poland in 2018. The idea was to place this classic piece in a contemporary setting, with a new approach and a new body of sound. However, the original score was used as a platform for the new reading, connecting history with the present. A score in this context is most often of a graphic nature to present reference points, visualized on the sleeve by Kim Hiorthoy’s cut-up adaption of Mats Gustafsson’s score. It’s also worth noticing that the instrumentation is more or less identical to that of 1971, the main difference being a tuba replacing one of the trombones. Finally, this new reading clocks in at 40 minutes, and is thus considerably longer than the 1971 version.
Tracklisting: Actions.