Fred Frith - Miya Masaoka - Larry Ochs (aka Maybe Monday) at The Back Room

Maybe Monday features Fred Frith (guitars, effects, etc.), Miya Masaoka (Dan Bao, electronics), and Larry Ochs (saxophones).

Maybe Monday performs entirely improvised music. The group performed for the first time at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco in March 1997 at the suggestion of Fred Frith, who at the time was in residence at Mills College, Oakland. A tour in 1998 allowed the group to focus its musical territory; the tour went to Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, Oakland, and Chicago with a later concert in San Francisco.

The music was well described in this review from the '97 Great American Music Hall concert: "The trio of Fred Frith, Miya Masaoka, and Larry Ochs is one of those groups that look unlikely on paper but once heard has an emotional logic that suggests they've always been there, doing that.... No strangers to each others' music — Frith and Ochs have been associated, via Rova, for many years, Frith has toured Europe with Masaoka (and Tom Cora), the musical lives of Ochs and Masaoka have intersected on several occasions — the trio enables these strong and instantly recognizable voices to re-invent themselves, finding quite other solutions in each others' company to those they might arrive at in other contexts. The delicate mesh of electric and acoustic, ethnic and urban, tradition and experiment sets up a tension in this music which places it apart from the high energy/noise-oriented confrontation that characterizes a lot of contemporary improvising. It's a tension, however, that is sometimes most ingeniously resolved. Contradictions abound — in the ferocious lyricism of Ochs, the placid aggression of Masaoka, Frith's passionate detachment — but the result, rather than shocking or unsettling the listener, is as familiar as breathing, as inevitable as fire." — Piet Schaap, June, 1997...

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Maybe Monday features Fred Frith (guitars, effects, etc.), Miya Masaoka (Dan Bao, electronics), and Larry Ochs (saxophones).

Maybe Monday performs entirely improvised music. The group performed for the first time at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco in March 1997 at the suggestion of Fred Frith, who at the time was in residence at Mills College, Oakland. A tour in 1998 allowed the group to focus its musical territory; the tour went to Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, Oakland, and Chicago with a later concert in San Francisco.

The music was well described in this review from the '97 Great American Music Hall concert: "The trio of Fred Frith, Miya Masaoka, and Larry Ochs is one of those groups that look unlikely on paper but once heard has an emotional logic that suggests they've always been there, doing that.... No strangers to each others' music — Frith and Ochs have been associated, via Rova, for many years, Frith has toured Europe with Masaoka (and Tom Cora), the musical lives of Ochs and Masaoka have intersected on several occasions — the trio enables these strong and instantly recognizable voices to re-invent themselves, finding quite other solutions in each others' company to those they might arrive at in other contexts. The delicate mesh of electric and acoustic, ethnic and urban, tradition and experiment sets up a tension in this music which places it apart from the high energy/noise-oriented confrontation that characterizes a lot of contemporary improvising. It's a tension, however, that is sometimes most ingeniously resolved. Contradictions abound — in the ferocious lyricism of Ochs, the placid aggression of Masaoka, Frith's passionate detachment — but the result, rather than shocking or unsettling the listener, is as familiar as breathing, as inevitable as fire." — Piet Schaap, June, 1997

Maybe Monday performed at least annually until 2007. This Back Room show will be the first trio concert since February 2011.

Tickets are $15 general admission, $12 with student ID. Advance tickets are available at the link below, or you may purchase your tickets at the door the night of the show. Doors open one half hour before show time. We accept cash only at the door (ATMs are nearby).

The Back Room is an all-ages, BYOB (for those 21+) space, dedicated to (mostly) acoustic music of all kinds. You are welcome to bring your own adult beverage with no additional corkage fee. If you need more information or have any questions, please call us: #510-654-3808. Thank you for your support!

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