"Cosa Brava is about storytelling. I don't think about it too much. It just turned out that way. Some of the stories have words and some don't, but they share a sense of scenes glimpsed in passing. Torn photos, fragments of movies, distant shouts. One of my earliest memories is of a long drive north, as our family moved away from London to start a new life in the Yorkshire dales. I remember the smell of the car, and passing our broken down removals lorry in the middle of night. I was four years old, and sometimes it feels like I've been on the road ever since. I need to travel, and now my life depends on it, so there's never a shortage of stories. The musicians of Cosa Brava are fellow nomads and experienced collaborators, and some of the best storytellers around, so my stories also become their stories. It's been an exhilarating journey, and I still have no idea where we're going. In the end it doesn't seem very important."
Fred Frith, February 2012, Liner Notes

Cosa Brava is an experimental rock and improvisation quartet formed in March 2008 by multi-instrumentalist and composer Fred Frith (Henry Cow, Skeleton Crew, Keep the Dog). Cosa Brava released in 2010 "Ragged Atlas" (Intakt CD 161) followed by "The Letter" in 2012 (Intakt CD 204).

Cosa Brava, 2012. Photo: Heike Liss

Fred Frith brilliert seit den 80er Jahren an der Nahtstelle von Rock und Avantgarde, Jazz und Folk. Der Gitarrist und Komponist machte sich früh einen Namen mit Bands wie Henry Cow, Slapp Happy, Art Bears, später mit Skeleton Crew und als Mitglied von John Zorns Naked City. Abenteuer in der freien Improvisation oder in der Neuer Musik der Komposition prägen das Wirken der letzten Jahre von Fred Frith.

Mit Cosa Brava bewegt sich Fred Frith auf der Bühne des kreativen Rock. Dies zusammen mit den grossen Musikerinnen Carla Kihlstedt (Tin Hat Trio) und Zeena Parkins (Björk), dem Schlagzeuger Matthias Bossi, dem Bassisten Shahzad Ismaily und dem Soundkünstler The Norman Conquest.