Davies, Hugh

Performances 1969 - 1977

Label: Another Timbre Country: UK

"Hugh Davies was one of the pioneers of 'free improvisation' in Europe from the mid-1960's. With extraordinary creativity he designed and built several 'invented instruments' incorporating objects from everyday life such as springs, hacksaw blades and egg-slicers. He humbly characterised this as 'D-I-Y music', but by amplifying the small sounds his instruments produced he developed a unique soundworld which was years ahead of his time.

These previously unpublished recordings are taken from the first decade of Hugh's work as an improviser. The first five tracks are solos, and the last is a duo for two shozygs with Richard Orton, a fellow pioneer and on-0time member of the ensemble Gentle Fire which Hugh set up in the late 1960's. 'Shozyg' was the name Hugh gave to one of his early instruments, which was housed inside the cover of a large encyclopaedia covering the letters SHO to ZYG.

This CDR is being released to accompany the CD For Hugh Davies (Another Timbre AT 11). On that disc these same recordings of Hugh were plyed back to a trio of current improvisers (Adam Bohman, Lee Patterson & Mark Wastell) who improvised around Hugh's music.

This CDR is dedicated to the memory of Hugh Davies woh died in January, 2005"-Another Timbre