Bill Bruford Announces 6CD Career Box Set Making A Song and Dance

Over the past 50 years Bill Bruford has been one of the most original and innovative drummers across multiple genres.  Making A Song and Dance: A Complete Career Collection is a 6CD Boxset that charts some of the many highlights of Bruford’s incredible career and is released on 29th April through BMG.

From early steps with progressive legends YES and a quarter of a century in King Crimson, to ground-breaking jazz fusion leading his own Bruford and Earthworks projects, Bill Bruford has always wanted to explore his chosen discipline to the full – and then push the boundaries further. This desire to challenge convention has created some breath-taking moments and made Bruford the drummer-of-choice for collaborations with leading musicians around the world.

“My interest was with the broader discourse on drums and drumming, rather than any notions of success or fame,” says Bruford. “The latter I could do little about but, in the 1960s, the former was wide open and meaningful contribution seemed everywhere possible. The context in which the first track in the set was conceived bears almost no relationship to the context in which the last was, four decades later.”

“There was a big premium put on the notion of difference. I wanted to sound different to contemporaries like Carl Palmer (ELP), Brian ‘Blinky’ Davison (Nice) or John Bonham (Led Zeppelin). I figured if I hadn’t heard it before, the other guys in the band probably hadn’t either. Thinking up interesting things to do on a drum kit was my reason to exist. I also thought that was what they were paying me to do. I didn’t care much what the critic, commentator or musicologist thought, and that was to remain my lodestone, my modus operandi for many years.”

For this anthology Bruford has selected tracks from across his whole career, comprising works from some 23 different artists and bands over a 40-year period. “I’ve deliberately avoided forcing them into industry categories such as ‘progressive rock’, ‘fusion’ or ‘jazz’,” Bruford adds, “on the grounds that most of the music I’ve been associated with fits very poorly into such straight-jackets – round holes and square pegs come to mind.”

The 6CD boxset Making A Song and Dance: A Complete Career Collection includes tracks from YES, King Crimson, Bruford, Bill Bruford’s Earthworks, his work with iconic global guitarists Al Di Meola, Steve Howe and Kazumi Watanabe and collaborations with keyboardists Patrick Moraz and Michiel Borstlap and many others. The package also includes a detailed biography, written by Bruford, featuring rare and unseen photos. The outer box artwork, gatefold CDs and booklet have been designed by Bruford’s long-time artist and graphic designer Dave McKean.

THE COLLABORATOR
disc One       

1.    Yes – I’ve Seen all Good People

2.    Yes – Heart of the Sunrise

3.    Yes – And You & I

4.    King Crimson – The Great Deceiver

5.    King Crimson – Fracture

6.    King Crimson – One More Red Nightmare 

7.    King Crimson – Starless

8.    U.K. – Nevermore

disc Two       

1.    King Crimson – Frame by Frame 

2.    King Crimson – Neal and Jack and Me

3.    King Crimson – Heartbeat

4.    King Crimson – Waiting Man

5.    Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, Howe – Brother of Mine (Radio Edit)

6.    King Crimson – Sex Sleep Eat Drink Dream

7.    King Crimson – Larks’ Tongues in Aspic: Pt 2

8.    King Crimson – Three of a Perfect Pair

9.    King Crimson – Man with an Open Heart

10. King Crimson – Elephant Talk

11. King Crimson – Indiscipline

12. King Crimson – Big Funk 

13. PianoCircus feat. Bill Bruford & Colin Riley – The Still Small Voice

disc THREE

1.    Bruford – Seems Like a Lifetime Ago: Pt 1

2.    Bruford – Seems Like a Lifetime Ago: Pt 2

3.    Bruford – One of a Kind: Pt 1

4.    Bruford – One of a Kind: Pt 2

5.    Bruford – Palewell Park

6.    Bruford – Joe Frazier

7.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – It Needn’t End in Tears

8.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – My Heart Declares a Holiday

9.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Downtown

10. Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Pilgrims’ Way

11. Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Temple of the Winds

12. Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Candles Still Flicker in Romania’s Dark

13. Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Nerve

14. Bruford, Towner, Gomez – Thistledown

disc FOUR

1.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Beelzebub

2.    Bruford-Levin – Original Sin

3.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Revel Without a Pause

4.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Triplicity

5.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – The Sound of Surprise

6.    Earthworks Underground Orchestra – Speaking in Wooden Tongues

7.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – Modern Folk

8.    Bill Bruford’s Earthworks – White Knuckle Wedding

9.    Earthworks Underground Orchestra – Footloose and Fancy Free

10. Earthworks Underground Orchestra – Thud

disc FIVE

1.    Roy Harper – Grown Ups are Just Silly Children

2.    Roy Harper – Hallucinating Light

3.    Chris Squire – Lucky Seven (Single Edit)

4.    Chris Squire – Silently Falling

5.    Al Di Meola – Calliope

6.    David Torn – Voodoo Chile

7.    Kazumi Watanabe – Andre

8.    Kazumi Watanabe – Small Wonder

9.    Steve Howe – The Inner Battle

10. Buddy Rich Big Band – Lingo

11. Pete Lockett’s Network of Sparks feat. Bill Bruford – Prism

12. PianoCircus feat. Bill Bruford & Colin Riley – Achilles Feel

disc SIX        

1.    Moraz-Bruford – Galatea

2.    Moraz-Bruford – Symmetry

3.    PianoCircus feat. Bill Bruford & Colin Riley – Stalling Between Two Fools

4.    King Crimson – No Warning

5.    Moraz-Bruford – Flags

6.    Moraz-Bruford -Split Seconds

7.    David Torn – Previous Man

8.    David Torn – Three Minutes of Pure Entertainment

9.    Bruford-Borstlap – 16 Kingdoms of the 5 Barbarians

10. Bruford-Borstlap – Stand on Zanzibar

11. Earthworks – With Friends Like These…

12. Bruford-Borstlap – Low Tide, Camber Sands

13. Bruford-Borstlap – Kinship

Making A Song and Dance: A Complete Career Collection is released as 6CD Boxset on 29th April through BMG.   Pre-order it here: https://billbruford.lnk.to/MASDPR