REWILD:
Grimal / Frith / Ducret / Silva / Hemingway
REWILD is a collective conceived by French saxophonist and composer Alexandra Grimal.
The ensemble brings together five highly acclaimed yet uncompromising and radical creative minds whose work has profoundly marked the field of adventurous music:
One of the defining figures of experimental music since the emergence of Henry Cow and the Rock in Opposition Movement, guitarist and composer Fred Frith;
French avant-garde guitarist Marc Ducret, whose vision is shaped by a distinctive approach to improvisation, composition and long-standing collaborations such as his work with Tim Berne;
One of the leading voices of today’s European improvised music scene, Portuguese trumpeter Susana Santos Silva;
And American drummer and composer Gerry Hemingway, whose decade-long collaboration with Anthony Braxton and work with a wide range of pioneering musicians have established him as one of the essential drummers and percussionists in the boundary-pushing jazz scene.
REWILD is built on a simple but demanding premise: each musician brings their own written ideas, fragments and cues into the ensemble, not as fixed repertoire but as shifting points of departure and crossings. These elements circulate through listening and response, constantly altered by contact, pressure, and contrast, operating in a state of flux.
Rather than moving toward an aesthetic agreement, the ensemble allows differences to remain visible at every moment. Composition, improvisation and experimentation intertwine without hierarchy, producing a field where dense structures break apart into detail, silence carries weight, and sudden lines of lyric clarity appear unexpectedly, forming a sonic ecology of nuanced interaction and resonance.
What is heard is a continuous state of reconfiguration—held together only by attention, friction and the precision of listening between five highly distinctive creative artists whose work has long moved across the edges of contemporary jazz and adventurous music.
Artists
Alexandra Grimal – soprano & tenor saxophone, voice
Fred Frith – guitar
Marc Ducret – guitar
Susana Santos Silva – trumpet
Gerry Hemingway – drums
Alexandra Grimal is a French saxophonist, vocalist, and composer, widely recognized as one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary jazz and European experimental music. Classically trained at the Paris Conservatoire and the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, she moves her artistic practice fluidly beyond conventional boundaries, combining refined lyricism with rigorous avant-garde exploration.
She has established herself as both a leading bandleader and a sought-after collaborator on both sides of the Atlantic, having recorded with jazz figures such as Lee Konitz, Gary Peacock, and Paul Motian on her critically acclaimed album Owls Talk, while also leading exploratory ensembles including her Nāga septet and the Fly Line trio.
Increasingly focused on multidisciplinary forms and large-scale composition, Grimal approaches listening as an active and radical engagement with space, form, and narrative. Her work spans chamber music, opéra clandestin’, sound installations, and symphonic pieces commissioned by institutions such as the Philharmonie de Paris.
A recipient of the MacDowell Fellowship and formerly a professor of composition at the Bern University of the Arts, she continues to explore the intersections between sound, visual arts, and nature, maintaining a central position within contemporary experimental creation.
Frith stands as one of the most distinctive figures to emerge from the experimental music movements of the late twentieth century. Co-founder of the legendary avant-rock collective Henry Cow and a lifelong multi-instrumentalist, composer and improviser, he first came to prominence within the late-1960s experimental rock scene before expanding his practice across guitar, violin, bass guitar and keyboards.
Alongside key projects such as Art Bears, Massacre, and Skeleton Crew, he has developed an extensive body of work that includes large-scale compositions performed by ensembles such as Ensemble Modern and the Rova Saxophone Quartet. His collaborative practice spans a wide range of figures in experimental and improvised music, from Robert Wyatt, John Zorn and Brian Eno to Derek Bailey, Bill Laswell and Bob Ostertag.
He has also worked extensively in film, most notably through Nicolas Humbert and Werner Penzel’s Step Across the Border and Thomas Riedelsheimer’s documentaries, which document and extend his artistic practice into cinematic form.
His contributions to experimental music were recognized with the 2008 Demetrio Stratos Prize, awarded for his lifetime achievements in the field. Alongside his artistic work, he held a long-standing pedagogical role at Mills College, where he influenced generations of experimental musicians.
Susana Santos Silva is a Portuguese trumpeter, improviser, and composer, widely regarded as one of the most commanding and compelling voices in contemporary jazz and free improvisation. With a background in both classical and jazz studies across Porto, Rotterdam, and Cologne, her artistic practice revolves around dismantling the traditional boundaries of her instrument. Through the mastery of extended techniques, microtonality, and textural breath work, she has crafted a distinct sonic vocabulary that moves between minimalist acoustic exploration and a fierce avant-garde approach, leading her own acclaimed projects like Impermanence.
An exceptionally prolific collaborator, Santos Silva is a vital force in the global experimental scene, known for her long-standing role in Mats Gustafsson’s monolithic Fire! Orchestra and her work alongside legendary figures such as Evan Parker and Anthony Braxton. Her recent work delves deeply into site-specific solo performances and electro-acoustic environments, treating sound as a visceral, spatial architecture. Based in Stockholm, she continuously redefines the trumpet's role in creative music, performing at major avant-garde platforms and contemporary festivals worldwide.
Marc Ducret is one of the most singular and uncompromising guitarists of his generation, standing as a defining force in European creative music and global avant-garde jazz. Renowned for his fiercely original vocabulary, Ducret deconstructs the traditional role of the guitar through asymmetrical phrasing, complex polyrhythms, and a brilliant manipulation of sonic textures. His legendary, decades-long collaboration with American saxophonist Tim Berne in seminal powerhouses like Big Satan, Bloodcount, and Science Friction helped redefine the boundaries of contemporary jazz, seamlessly bridging the New York downtown loft scene with European experimentalism.
Equally at home leading his own boundary-pushing ensembles or interacting with foundational European jazz icons such as Daniel Humair and Michel Portal, Ducret treats improvisation as an urgent, physical, and highly intellectual act. His extensive body of work, spanning solo recordings, tight-knit trios, and interdisciplinary large-scale projects, cements his reputation as a restless innovator who continues to challenge how the electric guitar is heard, felt, and understood in contemporary music.
For over fifty years, drummer, percussionist, and composer Gerry Hemingway has been a defining figure in creative music and avant-garde jazz. He is perhaps best known for his historic eleven-year tenure in the seminal Anthony Braxton Quartet (1983–1994), an ensemble that fundamentally reshaped modern jazz. Beyond this landmark collaboration, Hemingway has recorded and performed with a literal who's who of subterranean music, including Cecil Taylor, Derek Bailey, Leo Smith, and John Zorn, while consistently leading his own boundary-pushing ensembles.
Hemingway’s work exists at the precise intersection of rigorous structural composition and completely open, collective improvisation. Rather than acting as a traditional timekeeper, he approaches the drum set as a rich tonal palette, blending acoustic percussion with electro-acoustic experiments and multimedia. Across dozens of albums as a leader and a lifetime on the international festival circuit, his career remains a masterclass in how to balance discipline with absolute spontaneous freedom.
Photo credits:
Alexandra Grimal - © unknown / b&w © Pascal Bouclier
Susana Santos Silva - © Florian Fritsch / © Harald Krichel / b&w © Harald Krichel
Fred Frith - © unknown / b&w © Geert Vandepoele
Marc Ducret - © L. Poiget / b&W © Tsogi
Gerry Hemingway - © Simon Zangger / b&w ©Simon Zangger
