About the album 14 Years In The Fond Company Of: The Frèderyck Nùyegen Seaside Memorial Band.

The South African James Beckett reworks historical material that appears to have been directly borrowed from the archives of some faraway city. His ‘sampling’ of objects in museum collections evokes memories of the past, without it being clear what it is all about.In James Beckett’s studio, a sea of space in an office complex in Amsterdam Southeast, we hear the sound of music from the Cambodian Cassette Archives, a cult collection of Khmer folk and pop music recorded between the 1960s and the 1990s. The interpretations of Western music styles woven into the music are striking. Most of Beckett’s friends are musicians, and he himself plays guitar and saxophone.

In 2009, when he was asked to record an album for a project in Germany, he founded The Frèderyck Nùyegen Seaside Memorial Band for the occasion. This pseudo-ethnic band played hurdy-gurdys they had made themselves. Hurdy-gurdys are 16th-century instruments with an indefinable sound that some describe as melancholy and others consider more like howling tomcats. Collections play an important role in James Beckett’s art. Using found historical objects, he creates installations whose objectives are intentionally not always clear.

James Beckett (ZA/NL) 7/ 10/ 1977, Harare, Zimbabwe.
Currently based in New York City, US and Amsterdam, The Netherlands.