Introduction
Who is in it
Rehearsals
History
Audio

FBB, the Frakture Big Band, was originally started in 1998 after a series of workshops run by Phil Morton and Phil Hargreaves, then of Bonehouse, in conjunction with the first series of Frakture concerts. Since then it has become an important part of Liverpool’s musical life, acting as a conduit for musical exchanges, a meeting point for musical experimenters and a living laboratory for the experimentally minded.

Membership is loose with no known criteria, numbers can vary between 5 and 15, sometimes augmented by visiting musicians. The music can be completely improvised, based around composition (several band members have supplied compositions for the band), or based around some other structure; for instance we once did a performance of one minute improvisations, interspersed with recorded examples of the genre and haiku.

Past performances :

• have included major collaborations with bassist and composer Simon H Fell (1999),
• singer Maggie Nicols (2000)
• and we welcome Carlos Zingaro in November 2004..
• Major events include;
  • a three-hour improvisation in the Colourscape tent at the Pier Head,
  • Liverpool; the Dislocation Sermons, by Dinesh Allirajah and Phil Hargreaves, funded by the Year of the Artist. 

As well as formal concerts, the FBB network often gives rise to other, less structured performances and collaborations from within its ranks, often in collusion with the Bluecoat Arts Centre, who have been extremely helpful in providing facilities for the band over the last two or three years.

Recent Audio File : Nightsong : Frakture Big Band without Eddie Prevost }