The Previous Evening was composed by Frith and is divided into three parts, in which Frith pays homage to three contemporary classical composers, John Cage, Morton Feldman and Earle Brown. The CD booklet also contains the following dedication: "This recording is dedicated to my father, Donald Frith, whose support has been and continues to be warm and unwavering."[2]
The Previous Evening was originally commissioned by United Stateschoreographer . Part I was premiered by the London Contemporary Dance Theatre at Sadler's Wells, London in December 1993. Parts II and III were premiered by the in 1996, at the Tiroler Landestheater, Innsbruck and the Berliner Hebbel Theater, respectively.
Frith incorporated elements of John Cage, Morton Feldman and Earle Brown's working methods into the respective pieces on the album. "Fragments of text heard in Part I were taken at random from John Cage's book Silence: Lectures and Writings. Tape editing, the structure of events, and dynamic markings in this section were also determined using chance methods."[2] An Australian Dawn chorus appears in Part III, and other sound sources include works by Cage, Schumann, Mozart and "some bits and pieces of my own earlier work."[2]
^The Previous Evening (1997), released before Accidental (Music for Dance Volume 3) (2002), was designated "Music for Dance Volume 4" after Accidental was released.
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