MNP Archive

Our History

The Manchester Neo-Primitivists Archive was founded by Koraz Telamon and Ignatius Bee in 2006 as an effort to preserve the music and documents pertaining to the unfortunately obscure group of composers.

By 2014, Telamon and Bee, along with soon-to-be director Dr. Thomas Wakefield, had amassed almost 2 million pages of scores, manuscript sketches, letters, instrumental parts, visual art works, and writings from the 5 primary composers, as well as 19 minor collaborators of the movement.

Since then, the collection has expanded thanks to generous donations from the Estate of Dr. Alfred Bartholomew Bee following his death in 2019. A current count of all items is not yet available, but the Tape and Recording Archive at the MNP's New York Office amassed 8,472 cassettes and home reel-to-reel tape recordings, 590 vinyl records, 1,924 CDs & DVDs, and 112 photographs / video reels.

Telamon retired from the organization in March 2012, but took on an advisory role to the foundation's new director, Dr. Thomas Wakefield. In 2023, Dr. Wakefield retired and handed control of the archive and its resources to Ignatius Octothorpe Bee, the eldest son of Dr. Alfred Bee. Under Ignatius' control, the archive began releasing recordings and scores to the public through the "Manchester Neo-Primitivists Archive" YouTube channel.

However Ignatius, taking after his father, had the peculiar tendency to fabricate details with the goal of becoming more 'enigmatic' — in addition, his utter lack of management skills and increasing senility proved him an unfit director. In late 2025 Ignatius was forcibly removed as Archive Director and the position was given to Stanley Bee, Alfred's youngest son. Stanley currently manages operations for the archive from his home in Milwaukee, whilst its team of volunteers do so remotely from all around the world.

The archive currently manages a large team of volunteer engravers, who are working on a complete computer-engraved score and part set for Alfred Bee's seminal surrealist magnum opus, Mega Symphony — in addition, a small but dedicated team of on-site staff work to restore and publicize archival recordings and manuscripts.