Gabor Csupo

From Zappa Wiki Jawaka

"Frank Zappa would become a major influence on me artistically, inspiring me in my career to always go after the new, the pioneering and the challenging, never imitating anything, and always looking to surprise with the unexpected."

Born in Budapest, Hungary in 1952. After a music/art school education he trained as an animator. First heard FZ in his 20's from records smuggled in to Hungary from western countries. In a quest for freedom in the western world he left Hungary in 1975 leaving all his belongings - except for his collection of 500 records. Moving across Europe he arrived in Sweden where he met American Arlene Klasky. When she returned home to Los Angeles he followed her and they set up the Klasky-Csupo animation studio. They worked on The Simpsons. Csupo and Matt Groening tried, unsuccessfully, to persude the producers to hire Frank Zappa to score the show. FZ was a fan of The Simpsons and took his family to meet the animators at the studio. FZ invited Csupo to visit their home which was just a couple of minutes away from Csupo's. They became good friends sharing an interest in music, animation and politics. FZ agreed to supply the music for Csupo's new animated series Duckman and asked Csupo to create the cover art for The Lost Episodes album. In a 1995 magazine article Csupo described one meeting with FZ:

"One Friday night in the fall of 1991, Frank invited me and Arlene, along with a colleague of mine, Larry LeFrancis, to his recording studio to play his new composition that he was working on with the Synclavier. Frank's wife Gail walked in the room too, and before the demonstration, Frank told us that he had cancer and had a maximum of two more years to live. Then he pushed a button on his computer, and the most incredibly beautiful music came out of the six Yamaha speakers that surrounded us. I had to turn away because tears came to my eyes, and I listened to the song for over ten minutes with tears running down my face. Frank noticed, and at the end of the song he said, 'Don't worry, I'm not in the box yet......' "

Csupo founded the Tone Casualties and Casual Tonalities record labels in 1994 releasing his own and other experimental recordings.

Co-owned the short lived Lumpy Gravy Restaurant.