SVEN-ÅKE JOHANSSON, LIZ ALLBEE & ANNETTE KREBS

‘Frost’, 17 June 2015
Live recording with percussion, trumpet, seashell, e-guitar and electronics

Legendary percussionist Sven-Åke Johansson’s performance with Liz Allbee on trumpet and seashell and Annette Krebs on guitar and electronics, recorded live at Geoff Stern Art Space. A central figure in European improvised music and avant-garde art, Johansson (b. 1943 in Mariestad, Sweden) moved to Berlin in the late 1960s and became involved in the Zodiak Free Arts Lab on Hallesches Ufer.

Influenced by the Fluxus movement, Johansson’s early deconstruction of jazz percussion and free improvisation in the context of various artistic fields is a forerunner to the Echtzeitmusik scene that emerged in the 1990s in Berlin. His performances explore the relics of modernism through the use of quotidian materials such as cardboard and foam, questioning the boundaries between music and sound, abstract structure and tangible materiality, art and everyday life.

The entire performance is available for purchase as LP and digital download on Bandcamp. Portions of the performance were also filmed for the final concert sequence in director Antoine Prum’s documentary ‘Blue for a Moment’, a retrospective on Johansson’s artistic career.