seminal music group The Grande Mothers, featuring former members of Frank Zappa's Mothers Of Invention, are alive and well and playing a series of selected concerts in Canada in July 2006. The Grande Mothers performed to wildly enthusiastic audiences in Norway and Los Angeles this past April and plan to bring their special blend of musical mayhem to the Canadian shores.
The Grande Mothers, showcasing the talents of Zappa alumni, Napoleon Murphy Brock (lead vocals, tenor sax, woodwinds and choreography), Don Preston (vocals, keyboards and transformations), and Roy Estrada (vocals, bass and pachuco falsetto), along with musicians Chris Garcia (drums, percussion and vocals) and Ken Rosser (electric guitar and all the difficult Zappa licks) promise a night of thorough entertainment, featuring virtuosic playing, bizarre humor and the performance of many Zappa/Mothers beloved compositions; not only re-creating the music as was originally written and produced, but also breathing new life into it as well! Get ready to hear such Zappa penned classics as “I Am The Slime," “Muffin Man," “Florentine Pogen," “Andy," “Trouble Everyday," “Village Of The Sun" and many, many more.
The tour dates are as follows:
July 7-8 - Winnipeg Folk Festival - www.Winnipegfolkfestival.com
July 10 - Hughs Room Theatre - Toronto - www.hughsroom.com
July 12 - Ottawa Blues Festival - www.ottawa-bluesfest.ca
July 14-16 - Vancouver Music Festival - www.thefestival.bc.ca
The Grande Mothers have been performing worldwide continuously throughout the 2000's and have a CD release on Warner Classics (Germany) entitled A Grandmothers Night At The Gewandhaus, which documents the band's performance in Leipzig on March 27, 2003, and also features ex-Mothers members Bunk Gardner. (The CD is available on www.amazon.de)
In other Grande Mothers news, in Spring 2006 Don Preston completed a successful tour of the UK with electronic music group The Akashic Ensemble.
For more information contact All About Jazz.
