Bing & Ruth

History

David Moore founded Bing & Ruth in 2006 as a way to take his compositions beyond the classroom. While studying at the New School for Jazz in New York City, he aimed to create minimalist ensemble pieces with a cinematic feel, focusing on elegance and texture rather than the stark reduction often associated with the style. The band’s name comes from two characters in Amy Hempel’s 1980 short story “Daylight Come.” Their debut album, City Lake, came out in 2010, self-released in a limited edition of 250 copies.

At that time, the group had eleven members, which made touring and rehearsing a challenge. Struggling with the costs and logistics of selling vinyl from his basement, Moore connected with the experimental label RVNG Intl. Bing & Ruth signed with them in 2014 and released Tomorrow Was the Golden Age. The next year, City Lake was reissued in a larger run.

For Tomorrow Was the Golden Age, the lineup shrank to seven players: a pianist, two clarinetists, two bassists, a cellist, and a tape-delay operator. The music aimed to rekindle interest in the meditative pop traditions of Philip Glass and Harold Budd. In 2016, the band signed with 4AD and announced No Home of the Mind, which arrived in February 2017. That album was composed on seventeen different pianos across North America and Europe during various tours and travels.

It was recorded in just two days at a converted church in Hudson, New York, with a five-person ensemble, using minimal takes to preserve the spontaneity of classic session recording. On July 17, 2020, Bing & Ruth released Species through 4AD.