E.M.T.

E.M.T. (1972 – 1974) were an international experimental and free improvising music group with German multi-instrumantalist Alfred Harth, Swedish drummer and composer Sven-Åke Johansson, Belgian keyboarder and artist Nicole Van den Plas and guests.

History

In 1971 in search for a new artistic terrain Alfred Harth moved from Frankfurt/Main to live nearby Antwerp in Belgium playing with pianist and artist Nicole Van den Plas in duo with guests as her brother cellist Jean Van den Plas and later in 1972 with German bassist Peter Kowald and drummer Paul Lovens a.o. in Brugge and Antwerp a.o.. In 1971 Harth together with Van den Plas stayed for three months at the "Action Center" in Münchenwhere they played with Just Music cellist Thomas Stoewsand who had started to work for the label ECM and bass player Manfred Eicher.Harth was trying to persuade "Just Music" drummer Thomas Cremer to move to München and continue to work together.After having finished the group "Just Music" after a last tour in Poland in 1972 but keeping in regular touch with the Belgian free improvisation scene Harth and Van den Plas moved to live in Frankfurt/Main together with Cremer in Harth’s apartment where musicians and artists regularly visited and where the idea came up to found a small music circus.
In 1968 Harth had performed with drummer Sven-Ake Johansson ("Music is Happening") at the Zodiak Free Arts Lab in Berlin where they had sawed the stage as part of their music.Harth called up Johansson in 1972 and founded the trio E.M.T. with him and keyboarder Nicole Van den Plas who started to study art at the "Städel art academy" in Frankfurt/Main at that time. E.M.T. recorded for the label SAJ which had been founded by Johansson and merged with the label FMP. E.M.T. extended gradually their musical language,included guests from time to time and played many concerts in venues as the "Fabrik Hamburg", "Quasimodo" Berlin, Festival Antwerp. Johansson lived in Hamburg at that time and sent cassettes containing spoken ideas and musical samples as "working letters" to Harth and Van den Plas in Frankfurt.In 1974 together with Jean Van den Plas E.M.T. created a subformation "Heidnische Klänge" for a concert in Frankfurt/Main.In 1973/4 Harth was also a short time member in Gunter Hampel’s "Galaxie Dreamband" where he met loft jazz clarinet player Perry Robinson.
In 1974 E.M.T. had a last concert at the "Bunker" in Bielefeld and Harth went for three months to work with the loft jazz scene in New York City.
In 1979 Harth founded a punk jazz group with vocalist Christoph Anders, Cassiber, and asked Nicole Van den Plas to play the electric organ.
In 2007 Harth, Johansson and German pianist Uwe Oberg made a trio recording in Darmstadt.

Music

E.M.T. started focusing on extatically free improvisation in an explosive and expressive manner. Within the years E.M.T. extended gradually their musical language by incorporating dada like spoken words and improvised recitations inspired by Schönberg (Pierrot Lunaire),noise,improvised structures and composition fragments from European composers like Grieg, Schumann (the song "Ich grolle nicht" ) a.o. Harth extended his instruments to electric zither, contact mics, gongs, violin, accordion and percussion. Van den Plas played as well electric organ and Johansson integrated bowed cymbals and other concrete materials like playing on his drum cases or foam gum into his "Slingerland" called way of playing with "dynamic vibrations". In long passages the music of EMT had been also silent, electronical sounding and minimalistic.

Name

E.M.T. :
*Extreme Music Troop - “Troop“ in a sense like the German expression “Zirkus Truppe“
*Energy / Movement /TotaleThe name was given by Alfred Harth.

Discography

*"Canadian Cup of Coffee" FMP, 1974, [http://www.fmp-label.de/freemusicproduction/labelscatalog/saj02.html]
* a CD with unreleased music from E.M.T. is in preparation for 2008

References

*Schwab, Juergen. "Der Frankfurt Sound". Frankfurt/Main: Societaetsverlag, 2004
* "Sven-Ake Johansson,Plakate 1968 - 2003". Berlin:Verlag H+K,2005
*Christoph Wagner: "Brüche und Kontinuität".In “Neue Zeitschrift für Musik” 6/2007
*Johansson's discography: [http://www.efi.group.shef.ac.uk/mjohanss.html Ausführliche Diskographie und Kompositionsverzeichnis]
*Johansson at FMP: [http://www.fmp-label.de/freemusicproduction/musiker/johansson.html FMP Veröffentlichungen]
*Nicole Van den Plas,portray by galery huebner: [http://www.galerie-huebner.de/nicole.htm Porträt mit Einzel- und Gruppenausstellungen]