Fran & Flora - Precious Collection (2024)

Following their critically acclaimed 2019 debut album Unfurl, Hidden Notes Records are happy to announce the release of the multi-award-nominated experimental/contemporary folk string duo Fran & Flora’s sophomore full-length album, Precious Collection.

Released on Friday 12th April 2024, this album, produced by the duo themselves, explodes in myriad directions expressing the richness of the long-standing collaboration between Francesca Ter-Berg (cello/vocals/electronics) and Flora Curzon (violin/vocals/electronics). With Klezmer and Yiddish song as the predominant inspiration for the record, Precious Collection defies convention, featuring self-penned tunes and unique arrangements pushing their ground-breaking project beyond their virtuosic string playing. Drummers Ursula Russell (Ursa Major Moving Group) and Simon Roth (Chris Potter, Olivia Chaney) feature on the record on full kit and Ukrainian Poik (marching drum) respectively, and Francesca and Flora experiment with bowed cymbals, extended piano techniques, and samples of found sounds.

"We offer this album as a body of work which honours our creative collaboration, research, and desire to bring this much loved music to life in our own way. We are very fortunate to have access to so many sources in the forms of archival recordings and tune collections made available by the hard work of many of our colleagues in the Klezmer scene, and opportunities to travel and study with tradition bearers in Eastern Europe and North America. As well as traditional Jewish, Ukrainian, Greek, Transylvanian and Roma music, our inspiration includes free jazz, punk, improvised, post-rock, classical, ambient and drone-based music. We strive to keep our ears and minds open to new sounds, follow our artistic curiosities and be playful in our music-making. Our long-standing collaboration and friendship has grown in a way that gives space for creative vulnerability and continual exploration. ‘Precious Collection’ is about optimism, freedom to experiment, and creating music that comes straight from our hearts.

This album was written and recorded in remote regions of New Hampshire and Maine as well as by the sea in Margate and Ramsgate with a final addition of crusty Hackney magic."

Tracklist:
1.01 - Fran & Flora - Nudity (2:18)
1.02 - Fran & Flora - Romanian Fantasies ii (4:56)
1.03 - Fran & Flora - New Beginnings (5:32)
1.04 - Fran & Flora - Fishelekh Gefinen - To Catch a Fish (3:43)
1.05 - Fran & Flora - Nign (3:39)
1.06 - Fran & Flora - Kick Up In 9 (2:08)
1.07 - Fran & Flora - Dobriden - Hamanul (5:10)
1.08 - Fran & Flora - Feygele - Little Bird (2:28)
1.09 - Fran & Flora - Flowers for Innocence (3:20)
1.10 - Fran & Flora - Yikhes - Lineage (Doina iv) (6:27)
1.11 - Fran & Flora - Hold Me Close (4:17)
1.12 - Fran & Flora - Sholem Aleichem (2:08)