simon
h. fell ....selected
press quotes
"a
major contemporary musician" The
Penguin Guide To Jazz On CD
"a
powerful influence on the new music scene" Signal
To Noise
"Fell
thinks at lightning speed: he plays with an alertness that won't
hear of any slackness in the music. He's the best kind of
virtuoso." BBC
Music Magazine
"Simon
Fell is a performing musician of the highest order who seeks the
bridge the gap that has arisen between contemporary composition and
free improvisation. And Fell actually knows how to write for the
symphony orchestra - his music reveals a knowledge and understanding
of Varèse, Birtwistle and Stockhausen. By studiously avoiding
the slickness of cut'n'splice postmodernism (compare Fell's work with
Zorn's: both express their deep admiration for the contemporary
classical and free jazz/improv repertoires, but their compositional
approaches are a world apart), Fell doesn't - won't - make things
easy for you, but he makes it abundantly clear that to get anything
out of music you have to be prepared for the long haul." Signal
To Noise
"If
you haven't checked out Fell's music, I suggest strongly that you do
so soon. He's made some of the most exciting improvised music to come
out of Britain." Cadence
"There
are few musicians with ambition equal to that of Simon Fell. His
determination to externalise sounds that crowd his mind's ear has
resulted in some exhilarating, challenging, and at times creatively
perverse recordings." The
Wire
"By
any account, Simon Fell is one of the most important musicians
working today. As improviser, composer, and musical organizer, the
depth and range of his music is truly staggering." Signal
To Noise
"For
those unfamiliar with Fell, he is one of England's and perhaps the
world's most creative bassists and composers." Cadence
"A
leading figure on the improvised music scene in the UK, both as a
first-call bass player, and as a leader and composer." Jazz
On 3, BBC Radio 3
"Simon
Fell is probably England's most distinguished composer for
improvisers... he's a Lenin in a sea of mediocre anarchy." Resonance
FM
"His
integration of improvisation with 'classical' composition on such
releases as Kaleidozyklen,
Thirteen Rectangles,
and Composition
No. 30
are probably unmatched both for audacity and thoughtfulness (and
thats no mean feat). In his works, youll find blues, Boulez,
Ellingtonia, Stockhausen, Taylor, and noise - not just slapped
together, but organically merged." Bagatellen
"Fell
exemplifies the truly integrated composer/musician" One
Final Note
"Simon
H. Fell is a singular presence in modern music" Double
Bassist Magazine
"Bassist/composer
Simon H. Fell is one of the leading lights of the British improv
scene. Possessed with both striking ambition and a bounty of talent,
Fell has been involved with a wealth of projects of all shapes and
sizes, perhaps most significantly The London Improvisers Orchestra
and the Hession/Wilkinson/Fell trio. Sadly, Fell continues to be
somewhat under-recognized, despite his exceptional technical skills
and compelling compositional aspirations." One
Final Note
"There
are few musicians whose work spans as broad a range as Simon Fell.
As composer, improviser, and accomplished bass player, Fell's
restless creativity consistently shines through in a mind-boggling
range of contexts. What is astonishing, though, is how he manages to
pull all of his various interests together into an overarching
vision." Signal To Noise
"Un véritable prodige, absolument unique en son genre... un architecte hors pair pour une musique orchestrale passionnante qui mérite d'être découverte et écoutée pour son extrême et unique originalité." Orynx
bruce's
fingers:
"assiduously
documenting some superb music" The
Penguin Guide To Jazz
"a
new release from Bruce's Fingers is always a cause for
celebration.....some of the finest new music from Britain." Cadence
"One
of the most enterprising small independent labels around." Impressions,
BBC Radio 3
"A
superb record label; some of Britain's finest experimental new music."
Mixing It, BBC Radio 3
the
compilation series:
"some
of the most vivid and creative improvisation/composition fusions in
recent times......" The
Penguin Guide To Jazz
"Simon
Fell is a leading composer of his generation, crossing boundaries
and creating music of a passion and originality unusual in
Britain." The
Guinness Encyclopaedia Of Popular Music
"It's
hard to think of anybody in the UK among the jazz-related musicians
of his generation.....who is working on this scale and with such
audacious inventiveness."
The Wire
"The
sharpest dialogue between composition and improvisation realised by
any English composer." Resonance
"Fell
is laying the foundations for utopian music-making beyond the
divide. Serious stuff: the debate about 2lst-century music starts
right here. A:1*" Hifi
News & Record Review
"
Composition
No. 30
must be recognised as a significant event for British jazz." Improjazz
"I
am starting to believe that Simon H. Fell is one of the most
important composers alive, and releases like this just make the case
more cut-and-dried by the minute." RESONANCE
"The
monumental Composition
No.30 is, in my view,
an important monument in the history of late 20th
Century music. Nothing less than a summing up and distillation of the
experimental strains of Western music at the end of the millennium.
One of the most important musical works to come out of Britain since
the Sixties." Cadence
"Fell
has worked through several major modern musical developments this
century, and made them work that bit better." The
Sound Projector
"Composition
No. 30 is a new
landmark in the building of a boundless music: a Tower of Babel being
built by a utopian engineer of sound. This work, at the same time
both precomposed yet truly open to freedom, must mark the beginning
of a new era." Jazz
Magazine
"This
is truly a land-mark recording in contemporary music" Signal
To Noise
"The
lifetime masterpiece by a major contemporary musician - except, of
course, Fell is hopefully going to be delivering much more music to
us yet." The
Penguin Guide To Jazz On CD
"Composition
No. 30 combined
advanced serial composition, skronk improvisation and xenochronous,
overlayered recording with a finesse that staggered listeners." Signal
To Noise
"Composition
No. 62 explodes,
bubbling and rippling with details that cumulatively knock you back
on your earhole. It's as if Fell notated the first moments in the
existence of some universe whose fundamental property was sound
itself, examining its richness from every possible angle." Dusted
hession/wilkinson/fell:
"We
are talking the essence of what makes jazz great here." THE WIRE
"One
of the most exciting groups currently working." NOTES
"Remind
yourself of how creative, urgent and beautiful jazz can be." YORKSHIRE
POST
"Involvement
and intensity, invention and insurrection.....manna from
heaven.....Superb." HIFI NEWS & RECORD REVIEW
"There
probably isn't such a thing as state-of-the-art free music, but as a
term of convenient endearment, it's close enough." THE GUARDIAN
SOMETHING
ELSE:
"There's
passion, intellect and first-rate group interaction. What more can
one ask from a contemporary improvising trio?" CADENCE
"An
energetic trio, this group plays improvised music with relentless
passion and virtuosity." OPTION
"There's
an exceptional level of communication between the musicians here.
When the group is in full flight the flux of energy is
incredible." IMPROJAZZ
BADLAND:
"Put
this alongside the most important trios in the jazz and improvised
saxophone tradition." IMPROJAZZ
DESCENSION:
"Bassist
Simon H. Fell produces flawless improvisations, it seems, with an
awesome regularity these days, and Descension's new disc Live,
March 1995
is no exception." CADENCE
"A
glorious cascade of music that proves it is precisely the pursuit of
pure energy and dissonant thrill that can make something vital out of
improvisation.....It has the gauntlet-in-the-face impact of music
that changes lives." THE WIRE
"The
way Descension rearrange the building blocks of rock begs comparison
with bebop's rewrite of Broadway. Simply put: music to bet your life
on." HIFI NEWS & RECORD REVIEW
"Watching
this beautiful, jagged noise split the audience into warring camps
felt like one of the great countercultural blows of the 90s."
THE WIRE
IST:
"IST
operate at such a pitch of invention they transcend the divide
between art and science." HIFI NEWS & RECORD REVIEW
"An
extraordinary record. This is truly collective music, beautifully
self-contained and perfect as it is." AVANT
"IST
play gorgeous realtime realspace musique concrète. Subliminal
sensitivity to scratch and distortion produces ear-fixating
suites." HIFI NEWS & RECORD REVIEW
"IST
have developed into a leading force in improvised and creative
music, pushing the limits of acoustic string music beyond existing
boundaries." RESONANCE
"Ghost
Notes
will become an "instant improvised classic"! Impressive
enough to rate a MOST HIGHLY RECOMMENDED from this reviewer."
THE IMPROVISOR
VHF:
"VHF
have produced music of rare democratic brilliance, a music that
eschews virtuosity in favour of a group aesthetic." AVANT
SFQ:
"Outstanding!
We were hugely impressed by the way Thirteen
Rectangles dealt with the inherent problem of
composing for improvisers. Simon Fell is at the forefront of
developing musical structures which release - rather than constrain -
his collaborators." JAZZ ON 3, BBC RADIO 3
"Captured
in one breathtaking take, Thirteen
Rectangles
is an exceptional work. Even though the piece is scored for small
group, Fell thinks big, leaving plenty of room for solo playing. The
music draws jazz, free Improvisation and post-serial composition into
the same gravitational field, where they hybridise and mutate. It's
edgy and insistent, characterised by "neurotic rhythms".
The players chisel away repeatedly at Fell's deliberately meagre
allocation of thematic material, but he has jettisoned the formulaic
cycles of standard jazz composition in favour of "mobile
form". Written and improvised passages are heard in combination
throughout. This complex, stimulating simultaneity sets up
exhilarating juxtapositions and conjunctions that rise through the
music's continually shifting layers. Fell strives to actualise the
music he wants to hear but which doesn't yet exist. His creative
vision and individual labour might prepare the ground, but it's the
personality and abilities of the performers that bring his concept to
fruition. He's fortunate to have such dedicated, ingenious
collaborators, who each bring a distinctive slant to unlock the
composition's abundant potential." THE WIRE
"In
the context of Sonic Youth's embrace of 'noise', where a mistaken -
hazy and depoliticised - notion of '60s freedom has been mixed with
dubious poses derived from the Velvet Underground and marketed as
'avant', bassist/composer Simon Fell's crystalline music is like a
bucket of water so chill it's icy. Although he uses the full
capabilities of his non-pareil improvisors, as tunesmith Fell is
picking up on mid-'70s Anthony Braxton, when that amazing saxophonist
was developing something new in terms of composition. The way
quasi-traditional forms (Rectangle 6 is a New Orleans strut,
Rectangle 10 a blues) break into abstraction is seamless. Fell hears
the pressures and tensions of modernists like Varèse and
Feldman in jazz, so this is not some polystylistic experiment in
collage and the music is mercifully free of the tongue-in-cheek
smartness of the downtown crew. The musicians play in parallel lines,
accumulating arguments which may suddenly explode into transgressive
outbursts, giving the music the poignancy and tension of first time
sex between besotted lovers. The last time anything as pure as
Rectangle 10 was recorded in England, it was by Joe Harriott.
Today's scene badly needs this earnestness. A:1*" HIFI NEWS
"Simply
put, Thirteen Rectangles is a major work and thus, is one of the
most important releases of 2002. I found it to be a rewarding listen
and frankly, have reached the conclusion that Fell has truly created
his masterpiece." CADENCE
"Featuring
gnarly counterpoint, telepathic call and response sections,
collective improvisation, dynamic tempo shifts and solo cadenzas,
this is all-encompassing music, bridging the tenuous divide between
the composed and improvised. With an ensemble so perfectly in tune
with the composer's conception, one would be hard pressed to
distinguish the improvised from the composed on these pieces. For
those looking for the future of creative improvised music, Four
Compositions
is a must-have album." CADENCE
KALEIDOZYKLEN:
"Fell's
Composition No.57: Kaleidozyklen,
receiving its world premiere, is the latest in a long line of works
that have seen him wrestling with a bewildering array of
self-inflicted musical challenges, not least of which is how do you
get a large orchestral group to improvise freely around a system of
musical notation and not end up making a meaningless racket? Somehow
on this occasion, the University's contemporary music ensemble pulls
it off. How they do it, or indeed what exactly it is that they are
doing, remains a mystery. The warm response to the piece left Fell
beaming with joy. "I hope you find it as disconcerting as I
do," the composer wrote in the programme. Don't worry, Simon. We
did." THE GUARDIAN
"Kaleidozyklen
will have plenty of surprises in store for the patient listener long
after Zorn's pretty but somewhat vapid recent compositions have
yielded up their secrets." SIGNAL TO NOISE
photo © Jo Fell 2004
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