Del Meridian Arts Ensemble facevano parte all'epoca Jon Nelson, Joe Burgstaller, Daniel Grabois, Ben Herrington, Raymond Stewart e John Ferrari, e tutti conoscevano bene le musiche di Frank Zappa, avendole inserite spesso nei programmi dei loro concerti e in alcuni album - in particolare Smart Went Crazy (1993) e Prime Meridian (1995) - facendo tesoro di indicazioni e suggerimenti ottenuti personalmente da Frank. In occasione di una visita a casa Zappa nel 1996, qualche anno dopo la morte del Nostro, tennero lì un concertino acustico del tutto informale per rendergli omaggio e nel contempo allietare famigliari e amici presenti con vario altro materiale (soprattutto crimsoniano). A trent'anni di distanza ne esce ora la registrazione, in stile audio vérité: The Zappa House Concert.
"When we were in LA in 1996, Gail Zappa invited us to the house to play a Friday Soiree, a tradition that began when Frank invited musicians over to play informally. There was a legendary such evening when the Chieftains and Tuvan Singers played together with Johnny Guitar Watson. This was a big deal for us. We played in the Utility Muffin Research Kitchen for the Zappa family and their friends. Just as Frank liked it, we played a wide variety of repertoire, with Frank’s music comprising about twenty percent of the program. Frank’s longtime engineer Greg “Marqueson” Coy (we knew his name since Frank’s piece Marqueson’s Chicken was in our repertoire, and we played it at the concert) set up a single microphone in front of us and recorded the concert. That recording is what you hear on this disc.
This recording best represents the MAE as we were approaching the 10-year mark. We were true road dogs, playing 70 concerts that year, with epic overnight drives, couch surfing, questionable eating, not making any real money, lots of laughs, and grand artistic disagreements. We were true believers, doing whatever it took to get the music on stage, a guerrilla warfare version of chamber music. We made the rules up as we went along, always in service to the music. This program contains classical music, original compositions by group members, an NYC salsa arrangement from Jon and Ben’s past, and faithful transcriptions of pieces by King Crimson and Frank. Taking a page from Frank’s fondness for archival material, this disc is unedited and recorded with one mic and no mixing. The mastering process consisted solely of removing extraneous noise, balancing the left and right channels, and an extremely light EQ. What you hear is pure music in Frank’s studio as he would have heard it."
