In 1987, an LP by the Californian saxophone quartet “Rova” was published with the title “Beat Kennel”, recorded and released by a studio and label in Milan.
In Switzerland journalists, critics and fellow musicians wondered why an ensemble from San Francisco would put my name on their album. I knew this quartet, but otherwise had nothing to do with it.
When I once entered “Beat Kennel” (my real name) in the early days of Google Translate, it was translated as «schlag Hundehaus» (“beat dog house”).
«…Here we learn firsthand why the LP is called «Beat Kennel»: On 09.10.2022 at 16:02 the Rova musician Jon Raskin wrote to me: The term beat kennel wasn't in use as a phrase in our world. We thought the words beat kennel were descriptive of the types of rhythmic areas and ideas we were playing around with. A kennel is usually full of many types of dogs which will start barking at times each one interlacing its bark with the others. Each bark has a meaning and a rhythm so a music beat kennel was an appealing analogy for the interlacing of riffs that we explored. It also worked for us to think of the different works on the recording as coming from our kennel of pieces…»
