David Sait

Sixty Interpretations of Sixty Seconds by Sixty Solo Improvisers
Apprise Records AP-04

As much a triumph of organization and timbral arrangement as music, this matchless CD is the result of a unique initiative by Toronto-based guzheng player David Sait. During 2009 and 2010 he solicited and collected original 60-second recordings from 60 improvisers he had played with or admired in the past, then knit the results into 10 separate tracks, each of which encompasses improvisations from six of the participants.

Considering that anyone hearing the results wouldn’t realize that each 60-second cut was recorded independently of the others, the suturing is almost faultless. Bearing in mind that contributions came from Canada, the United States, Mexico, Argentina, Japan, Spain, Australia, Ukraine, France, Belarus, Finland, Austria, Germany, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Portugal, Belgium, Serbia, Ireland and Italy, the idea that cerebral improvising is universal suggests itself as well.

To take one example, on “9”, the captured voices and textures processed from Ben Roberts’ altered turntables and cassettes in Spain, crackle in such a way that the linkage with Briton Helen Gough’s field recording is palpable. Then the distanced puffs and mouth kisses that characterize Argentinean trumpeter Leonel Kaplan`s improvisation segue into the old-time country music strokes from Canadian Gerry McGoldrick’s shamisen, bleeding into Ronny Kipper’s church organ fanfares in the U.K., and conclude with the pseudo cool and groovy rhythmic pulses created by the whistling and keyboard of Italy’s Alessando Alessandroni.

Premeditation did however go into the selection of tracks and musicians for each section by Sait. The string player, who has developed unique tunings for his guzheng, has in the past performed or recorded with among others, American percussionist Gino Robair – featured on this CD – British bassoonist Mick Beck and American guitarist Eugene Chadbourne – who aren’t. Initially contacting improvisers in batches, he analyzed the sounds that arrived, and, to ensure that the one style or instrumental family wasn’t over-represented, then decided on which other players to approach and include.

Catholic in final execution, so-called ethnic instruments such as Ukrainian tsymbaly and Greek oud share space with more conventional sound makers such as guitars, pianos and saxophones. Unusual juxtapositions illuminate the various tracks in addition, as when the pressurized breaths of American alto saxophonist Joe McPhee abut the kinetic, near-boogie-woogie tinkles of Canadian pianist Michael Snow; or when the decidedly primitive clicks of Ireland’s Rob Coppard’s dedicated bones segue right into the modernist, but still non-tonal scrapes and bumps from Sweden’s Johannes Bergmark’s platform; with both textures fluently complemented by the slide guitar styling of the U.K.’s Philip Gibbs. Sait himself has only one 60-second solo, his multi-stringed plucks and resonations positioned between American Susan Alcorn’s pedal steel guitar twangs and the accordion-like pulsing of Pekko Käppi’s jouhikko from Finland.

This experiment may or may not be repeatable. But it certainly supplies novel and notable listening material with this CD.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. 1, 11, 111, 1111, 11111, 111111 2. 2, 22, 222, 2222, 22222, 222222 3. 3, 33, 333, 3333, 33333, 333333, 4. 4, 44, 444, 4444, 44444, 4444444 5. 5. 5. 55, 555, 5555, 55555, 555555 6. 6, 66, 666, 6666, 66666, 666666 7. 7, 77, 777, 7777, 77777, 777777 8. 8. 88. 888, 8888, 888888, 888888 9. 9, 99, 999, 9999, 99999, 999999 10. 10, 1010, 101010, 10101010, 1010101010, 101010101010

Personnel: 1. Linsey Pollak (rubber glove bagpipes); 11. Chas Smith (copper box); 111. Rachel Arnold (cello); 1111 Fatima Miranda (voice and field recordings); Todd Taylor (banjo) 2. Yurko Rafaliuk (tsymbaly); 22. Jeff Albert (trombone); 222. Laure Chailloux (diatonic accordion) 2222. Leon Gruenbaum (samchillian) 22222. Leanid Narushevich (guitar); 22222, Araz Salek (tar) 3. John Oswald (alto saxophone); 33. Christine Sehnaoui (alto saxophone); 333. Susan Alcorn (pedal steel guitar); 3333. David Sait (guzheng); 33333. Pekko Käppi (jouhikko); 333333. Andrea Centazzo (gong) 4. Misha Marks (prepared guitar); 44. Joana Sá (piano); 444. Martin Grütter (piano); 4444. Paul Dunmall (soprano saxophone); 44444. Joe Sorbara (drums and percussion); 444444. Kyle Bruckmann (oboe) 5. Damon Smith (field recordings, 7-string double bass and laptop) 55. Lawrence Casserley (monoharp, breath and signal processor) 555. John Butcher (soprano saxophone controlled feedback and piano resonator); 5555. Tom Boram (analog modular synthesizer); 55555. Ignatz (guitar, voice and drum); 555555. Helena Espvall (cello and effects) 6. Tim Hodgkinson (clarinet); 66. Beatrix Ward-Fernandez (theramin); 666. Christian Munthe (acoustic guitar); 6666. Mia Zabelka (violin and effects) 66666. Rayna Gellert (fiddle); 666666. Tobias Tinker (harpsichord) 7. Periklis Tsoukalas (oud); 77. Michael Keith (ukulele); 777. Szilárd Mezei (viola); 7777. Gino Robair (metal, glass, plastic, stone and motors); 77777 Joe McPhee (alto saxophone and voice); 777777 Michael Snow (piano) 8. Rob Coppard (bones) 88. Johannes Bergmark (platform ); 88. Philip Gibbs (slide guitar); 888. Aaron Ximm (field recording with broken radio); 88888. Philo Lenglet (prepared acoustic guitar) 888888. Carmel Raz (violin) 9. Ben Roberts (turntables and cassette decks) 99. Helena Gough (field recording); 999. Leonel Kaplan (trumpet) 9999. Gerry McGoldrick (shamisen); 99999. Ronny Krippner (church organ); 999999. Alessandro Alessandroni (keyboard and whistling) 10. Olivia De Prato (violin); 1010. Heribert Friedl (chair); 101010. Robin Hayward (microtonal tuba); 10101010. Bruno Duplant (bass); 1010101010. Mike Smith (hurdy gurdy); 101010101010. Paulo Chagas (oboe)

January 28, 2011

Bruckmann/Dafeldecker/Hauf

Wane
Formed 102

Michael Hartman Todd A. Carter Brent Gutzeit As TV POW
Southport S-SSD 0116

Prime instances of the Chicago-Vienna connection, these trios are committed to electro-improv’s reduced parameters, yet also succeed in magnifying these conventions beyond simple ambience.

Although both bands ostensibly feature a three-to-one ratio of acoustic to electronic instrument, you could never tell by casual listening to the drones, silences and squeals on the CDs. Each offers a memorable definition of how new players are shaping unique musical impulses to their own needs. Wane may be a little more notable however, perhaps because of its briefer length and possibly because its members are jobbing musicians rather than committed sound shapers.

TV POW’s Brent Gutzeit for instance, who plays keyboards, percussion and guitars here, initially organized the band while studying sculpture in Tokyo. His initial partner in TV POW is Michael Hartman, with whom he had been in a Kalamazoo, Mich. Band, and who plays percussion, computer and piano on this CD. Moving to Chicago, the duo added freelance audio engineer Todd Carter to form the definite TV POW trio which has been together ever since.

Interestingly enough when the trio is sometimes augmented by other musicians, one of them is on-and-off Chicago resident Boris Hauf, featured on Wane. Actually Viennese, Hauf, who plays baritone saxophone and synthesizers on the other CD, is best-known as a member of the band efzeg. Another Vienna resident, Wener Dafeldecker, who plays guitar and percussion on Wane, is a founder of Polwechsel. The third Wane participant is oboe and English horn player Kyle Bruckmann, a former Chicagoan turned Californians, who also leads the band Wrack.

Informed by the adaptable timbres of both acoustic and electronic sounds, the Wane trio almost seamlessly melds knob clicking and ring modulator whooshes with reed chirping and flutter-tonguing. Taking amp feedback and electronic drones to a place where they dissolve into string flanges and adding reed spetrofluctuation, the three maintain a horizontal interface. Yet there are also enough extruding resonating timbres and ratcheting strokes to keep the four almost-identically titled tracks rhythmically interesting and almost melodic.

“Going 2”, the nearly 14-minute centerpiece, finds modular bell ringing and circular metronomic pulses making common cause with tongue stops and reed osculation. Silences make way for scratches and vice versa, while pressured distortions appear to emanate as much from the guitar’s body as the strings themselves. Climaxing with irregular reed slurs, minute scrapes and ratchets and mechanized hisses, the echoing timbres eventually meshed without a glitch – electrical or acoustic. Here and elsewhere, however, it’s nearly impossible to definitely isolate one characteristic instrumental sound from another.

The members of TV POW, who play on, recorded, mixed and mastered their CD, aim for similar group transference. Committed to additional electronic impulses than the Wane trio, and lacking oral instrumental pitches, their sound is more repetitive and brittle. Languid and often wedding whooshing drones to low-frequency piano clusters, at points passages on the CD resemble the work of Australia’s The Necks or full-fledged minimalism.

Perhaps commenting on how creation is as much perspiration as inspiration, the three build up to the more-than-27 minute live final track, entitled “Sweating Just Sitting Here”. Practically a reductionist sonata, the timbres of this many-layered track shuffle from a single cymbal slap and wavering organ chords and inflate to a protoplasmic mass of shifting wave forms that seem to be informed by rock-like string and drum rhythms.

Following a section devoted to bass drum booming and woodblock popping resonation, it seems as if inflexible objects are being bluntly smacked and shoved along the floor as bent bottleneck-like strings whine. Finally percussive flams and rebounds complete the thought. A penultimate variation finds another ascending organ chord interrupted by real-time applause, grunts and coughs – from an invited audience or the performers isn’t made clear – in addition to top-of-cymbal scrapes. Repetitive guitar background chords plus sampled cymbal echoes signal the throbbing ending.

Both Mid-Westerners and Mid-Easterners take the pulse of lower case improv here. Only length and instrumentation may determine which the listener finds more satisfying.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Pow: 1. The International Brigade 2. Maybe it’s the Alternator 3. I’m Working on it Right Now 4. Chicago Underground Laptop Trio 5. Sweating Just Sitting Here

Personnel: Pow: Todd A. Carter (computer, piano, guitar, percussion, shakes, organ and canjo); Brent Gutzeit (piano, chimes, guitar, vocals, drinks, shakers, bells/chimes, sleep and organ); Michael Hartman (drums, computer, piano, percussion, shakers, singing bowl and bells)

Track Listing: Wane: 1. Going (1) 2. Going (2) 3. Going (3) 4. Gone

Personnel Wane: Kyle Bruckmann (oboe and English horn); Boris Hauf (baritone saxophone and synthesizers); Werner Dafeldecker (guitar and percussion)

October 30, 2006

GUILLERMO GREGORIO

Coplanar
New World Records NW 80639-2

Truthfully a New music session, the eight notated compositions by Argentinean-American composer/reedist Guillermo Gregorio owe their overall careful implementation and shape to more than the Chicago-based saxophonist and clarinetist’s theoretical basis for writing. Nearly all of the members of Gregorio’s Madi ensemble and featured guests have experience with improvised music, including the leader himself. Additionally he has such respect for the spontaneous impulse that space was left in the final track for an improvisation by bass clarinetist Ken Vandermark.

Some of the scores also allow the players to make decision about the direction in which to connect with thorough-composed parts. The spatial arrangement of the material, including notated silences, relates to a theory developed among Argentinean visual artists during Gregorio’s youth stating that all shapes, even when separated by empty spaces, belong to the same plane. To those unfamiliar with such arguments however, it’s obvious that COPLANAR has definite antecedents in both 20th Century so-called serious music and jazz-improv.

Briefly, ensemble member Jim Baker, who plays piano and synthesizer, often works with AACM tenor saxophonist Fred Anderson; oboist and accordionist Kyle Bruckmann, who recently relocated to the Bay area, is featured in the all improv EKG duo; guitarist John Corbett is a writer/producer responsible for Atavistic Records’ Unheard Music series; and cellist Fred Lonberg-Hom seems to be on every second CD in Chicago and has just joined the Vandermark5. Other players have a more so-called classical background. Guest clarinetist Aram Shelton is in at least two bands made up of younger improvisers; and Swiss tubaist Marc Unternährer is a member of the aptly named Chicago-Luzern Exchange; and even Irish composer Jennifer Walshe, who sounds like a cut-rate Maggie Nichols on the one track in which she is featured, also performs as an improvising vocalist. Vandermark, of course plays with numerous improvisers throughout North America and Europe.

Actually except that his multiphonic interpretation is a little more upfront, the nearly 14 minutes of “Coplanar 5” that features Vandermark don’t sound that much different from the other tracks. Completely improvised or not, his primitivist split tones and smeared growls mesh almost faultlessly with the circling tremolo strings and layered horn pulsations. Before a coda of disconnected piano chords wraps up everything, the reedist’s squeaking has melted into near-silent tongue slaps.

Other pieces, such as the nearly 16½-minute “Coplanar 1 + 2” and “White Coplanar” confirm this. The later track, designed for Warren Po’s cracklebox, or early miniature simple synthesizer, as well as Jen Clare Paulson’s viola and Gregorio’s clarinet, builds tension by playing up the disparity between the jittering toy-like qualities of Po’s instrument and the smooth glissandi of the others’. Cracklebox sizzling and fluttering almost rough up the clarinet’s near legit tone.

As for “Coplanar 1 + 2”, the layered rubato scrapes and slides from those experienced in improv in other contexts such as Corbett, Baker and Lonberg-Holm, bring a certain fissure to massed andante chords from the rest of the ensemble. As Baker’s synthesizer triggers flanged snorts, burps and gurgles, the cross modulations from the others toughens as well. Scraped guitar lines interact with the thump of arco bass as ratcheting percussive timbres appear. Created in broken octaves, the irregular vibrations of Bruckmann’s oboe contrast with Gregorio’s pinched clarinet tone.

Adding Unternährer’s tuba and Bruckmann playing accordion as well as oboe, “Construction with Coplanar” brings the composer’s ideas into boldest relief. Polyphonically biting off jagged timbres, the duo’s parts stand out from the more legato string and horn accompaniment. After tuba honks and spiccato runs from the cellist, the composer’s resolutely straight clarinet playing almost stands by itself.

Perhaps the lesson here, which Gregorio may agree with, is that with COPLANAR, he has reached full maturity as a composer. Yet negotiation of his compositions’ intricacies entails the involvement of musicians more versatile than he. Perhaps, one could say, it demands those who are more familiar with the improv experience.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: One: 1. Coplanar 1 + 2 2. Coplanar 4 (for oboe, clarinet, tuba and cello)* 3. Coplanar 3 (for piano and strings) 3# 4. White Coplanar (for clarinet, viola and cracklebox)% 5. Construction with Coplanar (for oboe/accordion, clarinet/alto saxophone, tuba, and cello)* 6. Madi Piece (for guitar and strings) 7. Swiss Coplanar (for voice, tuba, and piano)*^ 8. Coplanar 5 (for bass clarinet, clarinets, strings and piano)+

Personnel: Marc Unternährer (tuba)*; Guillermo Gregorio (clarinet and alto saxophone); Kyle Bruckmann (oboe or accordion); Aram Shelton (E-flat clarinet)+; Ken Vandermark (bass clarinet)+; Jim Baker (piano or ARP synthesizer); Steffen Schleiermacher (piano)#; Jen Clare Paulson (viola); Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello); John Corbett (guitar); Michael Cameron (bass); Warren Po (cracklebox)%; Jennifer Walshe (voice)^

April 10, 2006

IAN SMITH/SIMON H. FELL/HARRIS EISENSTADT

K3
Bruce’s Fingers BF 58

HARRIS EISENSTADT
Ahimsa Orchestra
Nine Winds NWCD0237

Having established himself with hard work as an in-demand percussionist and band leader in Los Angeles, Toronto-born Harris Eisenstadt is branching out. He’s traveling to the East Coast, Europe and Africa to match wits with his improvising contemporaries and writing more involved compositions for larger ensembles.

K3 is an example of the former, where he hooks up with British-born bassist Simon H. Fell, who now lives in France, and Dublin-born, London-based trumpeter Ian Smith. Conversely the Ahimsa Orchestra is a local project, featuring the percussionist, conductor Omid Zoufonoun and two differently constituted, 12-piece ensembles running through two of Eisenstadt’s compositions, the three-part “Non-Violence” and the four-section “Relief”. Kudos must go to the young drummer for attempting different projects. However, while he fits comfortably with Smith and Fell, his reach seems to have exceeded his grasp with the 67-minute CD by the band named with Mahatma Gandhi’s word for enemy-loving non-violence.

Throughout the parts are greater than their sum, since some of the West Coast’s most accomplished, outsides players – including trumpeters Dan Clucas and Kris Tiner, tubaist Mark Weaver, reedists Vinny Golia, Kyle Bruckmann and Sara Schoenbeck, guitarist Noah Phillips, and trapsmen Alex Cline and Eisenstadt himself

– get to show off their skills.

Unfortunately, the surrounding through-composed passages are non-connective and nearly threadbare. Orphan riffs are one thing, but when they resemble intermezzos and leitmotifs that can’t decide whether to be impressionistic or early 20th century classical, chutzpah takes the place of coherence.

Probably the best playing comes in the last section of the second suite when several countermelodies featuring Ellen Barr’s flute, Clucas’ muted trumpet and Bill Casale’s pulsating bass give way to an undulating stentorian tuba solo from Weaver that’s perfectly backed by bounces and flams from Eisenstadt. When the drummer turns to a more conventional rhythm, the trumpeter’s tremolo trills shine, suggesting that “Relief IV” may be a postlude rather than a proper climax.

Earlier in the same suite, driven by the rattles and rims shots from the understated percussion of the composer and Cline, massed orchestral harmonies give way to a squirming clarinet solo from Brain Walsh and a glottal lower register bassoon line from Schoenbeck that precede an conclusive crescendo. Splayed, cross-sawed textures from guitarist Phillips’ follow bell resonation from the percussionists, with both players rolling and rumbling through the penultimate thematic variation as sputtered split tones and pitch-sliding vibrations courtesy of Walsh and Golia produce diffuse harmonies. Still, despite Weaver’s obbligato and a horn crescendo, the overall impression is cold because the compositional glue holding the piece together seems to be lacking.

It’s the same story with “Non-Violence” despite some harmonic coloration created by a piccolo-trumpet tremor, valve twisting plunger work from trombonist Toyoji Tomita, reed squeaks and aviary twitters and sophisticated bass drum spots and reverberating cymbal parts from Eisenstadt. Here the connective material appears even more prettified than on the subsequent composition. Simultaneously though, there’s too little of it as well, often exposing the disconnected motifs among the yowling, rubato reed and brass timbres.

The situation was more balanced a year earlier at London’s Klinker club during the trio meeting. A memento of the drummer’s visit to the United Kingdom, Eisenstadt’s apparently more relaxed in the improvisational role on the four instant compositions here. Fell, who is has been a consummate combo player for years – as well as being an ambitious composer – is an asset in any circumstances, but the biggest surprise is Smith.

A far cry from his tentative work from three years previous when he recorded alongside some BritImprov veterans, his confident soloing in all registers of the horn easily allows him to hold up his part of the triangular equation. Perhaps consistent work with the London Improvisers Orchestra, consisting of some of the city’s most accomplished improvisers has toughened his chops.

No matter the cause, the spurts of resolute brass timbres with which he decorates his solo on the last three minutes of “Voiceless Velar Stop” are some of the most impressive trumpeting anywhere. Smith appends a few bent notes as a coda, having been hectored along by steady bowing from Fell and blunt ratamacues from Eisenstadt. Prior to that, the trumpeter moves from audacious mouthpiece tongue kisses to wah-wah buzzes plus clenched teeth slurs; he’s so in step with the drummer, that often a tone could be as much brass as percussion.

Imbued with the sprit of older British rhythm makers like Tony Oxley and Roger Turner, Eisenstadt sleekly works his way through his kit, matching heavy knocking on the rims with split-second whispering reverberation, and clanging chains on top of the heads as often as he attacks them full force. Someone who has studied with the griots in Africa, he brings darbuka and djembe hand-drum resonations to other sections, such as an extended work-out on the final track which contrasts nicely with Fell’s legato, Europeanized bowed notes.

Able to express spiccato vibrations with the same ease as walking, the bassist’s string organization encompasses buzzing sul tasto excursions and sections where he moves the tonal centre with polyrhythmic scratches and reverb. Strumming and sometimes nearly in slap bass territory, Fell is never at a loss as to how to rebound the pulse back and forth to the others. Plus the trumpeter is there to let loose with anything including sonorous pedal tones, purring valve whistling, fowl-like quacks, speedy brass bites and plunger whines.

Maybe one day Eisenstadt can translate his impressive performing and compositional talent from small combos to larger ones. Perhaps working with a more compact group would have benefited his conception for the AHIMSA ORCHESTRA. As it stands now though, K3 is a keeper, with the other CD of most interest to those who want to preserve every marker in the drummer’s accelerating career.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: K3: 1. Potassium 2. 1024 Words 3. Voiceless Velar Stop 4. The Unit Vector Along the Z-Axis

Personnel: K3: Ian Smith (trumpet); Simon H. Fell (bass); Harris Eisenstadt (percussion)

Track Listing: Ahimsa: Non-Violence: 1. I 2. II 3. III Relief: 4. I 5. II 6. III 7. IV

Personnel: Ahimsa:

Tracks 1-3: Liz Allbee and Kris Tiner (trumpet); Toyoji Tomita (trombone); Phillip Greenlief (b-flat clarinet); Kyle Bruckmann (oboe); Sara Schoenbeck (bassoon); Steve Adams (C flute); Bill Horvitz and Noah Phillips (guitars); George Cremaschi (bass); David Branddt (vibraphone); Harris Eisenstadt (percussion); Omid Zoufonoun (conductor) Tracks 4-7: Dan Clucas (trumpet); George McMullen (trombone); Mark Weaver (tuba); Brian Walsh (b-flat clarinet); Sara Schoenbeck (bassoon); Vinny Golia (bass clarinet); Ellen Burr (C flute); Phillips (guitar); Jessica Catron (cello); Bill Casale (bass); Eisenstadt and Alex Cline (percussion); Omid Zoufonoun (conductor)

January 30, 2006

SCOTT ROSENBERG

Creative Orchestra Music, Chicago 2001
New World # 80572-2

WALTER THOMPSON ORCHESTRA
Pexo - A Soundpainting Symphony
9Winds NWCD0234

Creating structures for ensembles of improvising musicians and voices is the thread that unites these two sessions. Scott Rosenberg and Walter Thompson have formulated different paths to creation -- the former by mixing improv and written material, the later by utilizing a composing-conducting system of gestured signals.

Although both methods are praiseworthy, neither disc is 100 per cent satisfying. That’s because application of the theory sometimes breaks down in the spontaneously recorded practice.

On the up side the music on these discs demonstrates that each man has already met a formidable challenge. Rosenberg, who usually plays saxophone with experimenters like Anthony Braxton, has created, adapted and conducts five longish compositions for an ad hoc mixed orchestra of 26 of Chicago’s top musicians plus a couple of West Coast ringers. PEXO, on the other hand, is the newest example of what Thompson, a woodwinds player and educator, who has taught the concept in the United States and Europe, calls soundpainting. The CD is the aural souvenir of how Thompson’s orchestra, which he founded in 1984, and includes instrumentalists, dancers, actors and visual artists, improvises material across all media as directed by Thompson. Counting actors, he manages to express the breadth of his vocabulary and vision with only 16 performers here.

Paradoxically, however, it may be the thespian vocal theatricality that retards full realization of his symphonic aspirations. Meanwhile, in his CD’s title -- CREATIVE ORCHESTRA MUSIC CHICAGO (COMC) 2001 -- not to mention some of the music here, Rosenberg proclaims the major influence from his former teacher Braxton’s Ghost Trance Music (GTM), as well as other composers like Morton Feldman and Muhal Richard Abrams. Yet if COMC takes its inspiration from Braxton, PEXO appears to take it from Bob Barker. No musician, Bob Barker has been host of The Price Is Right, the longest running and highest rated daytime game show in television history for more than 30 years.

PEXO’s nearly 19-minute, longest composition is named for Barker and while the entire album is described as an “abstracted sound version of a visit to a TV studio”. However, the need for dramatic color and expression for voices seems to have overloaded the game show aspect -- thus “Bob Barker”. With the mumbled words from the actors suggesting that an after-the-fact written libretto may have been a good idea, the few, rather banal, phrases that peep though the miasmic instrumental sound include “keep watching for your number”, “Peggy has won a love seat” and “I can’t believe I lost”.

At other points the actors make onomatopoeia out of Barker’s name and certain syllables, vying for aural space with tuba bottom blasts, massed horn ejaculations and baroque trumpet flourishes. Too often, though, the instrumental passages merely seem to comment on the words rather than creating their own POV. Even a crackling, pseudo Bird-like alto runs and a bass thump reminiscent of Oscar Pettiford don’t make strong enough impressions. Pumping horn lines and rock music-like percussion plops don’t seem like much when they’re coupled with near-hysterical laughter. Plus a more original thought would have been to accompany the cry of “no score” with something other than weepy violins.

Perhaps visuals allow the performers’ work to seem less like speechifying. However on disc, whenever with the thematic material is transmitted through a particularly fluid instrumental passage, the disjoined stops and starts in the performance appear to reflect actorly hesitation rather than pure improv. Only a few times does Thompson’s theory take root, as when a plunger trumpet growl amplify the emotions expressed by an actor bubbling out his lines.

Even the end track, “Two Talk Show Hosts” doesn’t seem to offer enough verbal articulation to reflect the title. A singular male voice appears to be too sinister for the affable host role. Meanwhile the false hilarity of laugher in varied cadenzas, tempos and pitches vying for space with speedy, dissonant slides, glissandos and cadenzas from the horns doesn’t so much suggest network TV as much as a production midway between word play and The Living Theater.

On COMC meanwhile, Rosenberg’s most serious misstep comes with “Toys”, which is described as reflecting playful and creative anarchy, with the band split into five groups playing with different “toys”. Written, rather than improvised, the ghost of Braxton’s GTM hovers over the entire performance, perhaps understandably since Rosenberg and a couple of the other musicians had recorded a GTM piece with the maestro two months previously. Despite its more than 18½-minute length “Toys” never really comes into aural focus, with everything from the repetitive reed accompaniment and its detour into march time in one section defeating the concept.

Overly thematic, and again with no improvisation, “Wash” is unconsciously akin to Bob Graettinger’s “City of Glass score” for Stan Kenton orchestra. For all of its nine- plus minutes the piece merely surges along in torrents of thick timbres … then just ends.

Far more impressive are Rosenberg’s other -- coincidentally newer -- compositions. “Forgetting Song” takes full advantage of the wordless vocalizing of Carol Genetti, an idiom mixer who has performed with composer Pauline Oliveros and drummer Michael Zerang among many others. Like Kate Hammond-Vaughan with Vancouver’s NOW Orchestra and unlike the actors on PEXO, Genetti fits ball-and-socket into the improvisations.

Singing expositions that include nonsense natterings, keening falsetto melisma and held notes that dip into a false basso range, she matches the billows, flutters and swells of the band members’ output. Most notable instrumentally are the equestrian clip clops from what appear to be bongos and congas played by a drum machine, showcased along with vibraharp pressure by the three percussionists. With a modulated mid-section of guitars, basses and the percussionists, the tune builds to a final denouement of light plunger brass and mellifluent reeds.

The other two compositions are thicker, but dense in a commendable fashion. They allow the pile up of strings, bass, reeds and percussion to deceptively augment the sound until they fracture the orchestral building blocks into organized chaos. However, these patterns of widely spaced intervals and short, colored interjections are so solid, that individual contributions are submerged into the whole, much as they are on PEXO.

Of course with 26 players on hand, the odd synthesizer oscillations from Jim Baker, reverb feedback from guitarists John Shiurba and Nathaniel Braddock and oboe punctuation from Kyle Bruckmann stands out. Still if any are extended techniques like flutter tonguing are put into play, it’s usually part of a group effort.

Still learning, Rosenberg, born in 1972 shows with CREATIVE ORCHESTRA MUSIC CHICAGO (COMC) 2001 that he’s well on his way to write memorable compositions. He’s still working his way through apprentice missteps.

Thompson, with a longer résumé, has compared his concept of soundpainting to flipping through 100 TV channels at random and creating meaningful patterns from the musical, textural, and visual associations. As good as some sections of PEXO are, it’s evident that a DVD multi-media presentation of his orchestra would be far more satisfying than this disc.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Creative: 1. Tehr 2. Wash 3. 7x with Sttm 4. Forgetting Song 5. Toys

Personnel: Creative: Todd Margasak, Nathaniel Walcott (trumpets); Jeb Bishop, Nick Broste (trombones); Megan Tiedt (tuba); Lisa Goethe-McGinn (flute); Kyle Bruckmann (oboe); Jesse Gilbert, Paul Hartsaw, Laurie Lee Moses, Todd Munnik Matt Bauder, Aram Shelton (saxophones and clarinets); Jen Clare Paulson (viola); Chris Hoffman, Drew Morgan (cellos); John Shiurba, Nathaniel Braddock (guitars); Jim Baker (piano and synthesizer); Kyle Hernandez, Elizabeth Kennedy, Jason Roebke (basses) Jerome Bryerton, Steve Butters and Tim Daisy (percussion); Carol Genetti (vocals); Scott Rosenberg (conductor)

Track Listing: Pexo: 1. Entrance 2. Prepare 3. Get Ready 4. Bob Barker 5. The Crowd 6. Two Talk Show Hosts

Personnel: Pexo: Rob Henke (trumpet); Sarah Weaver (trombone); Christopher Washburne (trombone, tuba); Jody Espina (alto saxophone); Michaël Attias (alto and baritone saxophones); Julie Ferrara (oboe and English horn); Rolf Sturm (guitar and synthesizer); Todd Reynolds (violin and conductor); Gil Selinger (cello); Jim Whitney (bass); Steve Rust (bass and electric bass); Andrea Pryor and Greg Stare (percussion); Leese Walker, Michael David Gordon, Christian Brandjes (actors); Walter Thompson (conductor)

April 5, 2004

KYLE BRUCKMANN

Wrack
Red Toucan # RT 9323

PAGO LIBRE
Phoenix
Leo Records LR 377

Classically trained players as familiar with improvised as notated music are no longer a novelty in the 21st Century, mostly in Europe and latterly in North America.

However what’s most notable about this, as these two CDs show, is not whether musicians know the idioms but to what end they put that understanding.

WRACK is striking, as woodwind player Kyle Bruckmann steers a quintet of Chicago-based stylists to a color field that takes from both jazz and so-called European Art Music. PHOENIX isn’t as remarkable because the dramatic sound clashes Bruckmann has programmed into his music are replaced by gentler concordance from the cooperative band of one Russian, one Italian, one Austrian and an Irish-born Swiss resident. The four attempt to mesh not only so-called jazz and classical influences, but also site-specific ethnic ones as well.

Besides Bruckmann, an oboist and English hornist who has played in chamber groups as well with improvisers like guitarist Scott Fields and used electronics in the EKG duo, the other two players who help propel WRACK’s seven compositions have a jazz background. Trombonist Jeb Bishop and percussionist Tim Daisy work in various groups with reedist Ken Vandermark among others.

Here, there doesn’t seem to be a track that doesn’t befit from Daisy’s pointed, often broken rhythms that move from marching band cadences to chilly Webernian implications. Bishop too makes the most of the mutes, mouthpiece buzzes and slide positions that jazzmen introduced to the musical gestalt.

On “Gearshifts & Parenthericals”, for instance, his output glides from sonorous, vocalizing noise-making to mid-range grace notes, with a polyphonic sweep created when he, the oboist and violist Jen Clare Paulson sound the same notes in different timbres. Meanwhile, the percussionist supplies pots-and-pans style rattles and some drum stick nerve beats, while bassist Kurt Johnson first appears to using his bow to bang the front of his strings, then chops out counterlines.

Johnson and Daisy function more like a traditional rhythm section behind the main theme on “Extenuating Circumstances”, after which Bruckmann’s ney-like sound outlines a slinky, shimmering secondary theme. As the tempo slows, Paulson showcases glissandi that overlay elongated horn and ‘bone grace notes. Finally, angular percussion work that suggest Xenakis’ writing, and a bass continuum give Bishop the base on which to emphasize different slide positions for maximum color variations.

“Elegy for a Boiled Frog” combines many musical strands. It has an oboe part that appears to have migrated from a Tchaikovsky score, pointed sawing from the strings, buzzy, gutbucket trombone lines that could easily make it in a Classic Jazz context, and a concise rat tat tat from the drummer reminiscent of rock.

Not everything works perfectly however. At 13 plus minutes, mitigating factors make the dissonant, dispirited harmonies of “Mitigating Factors” sound less like a Stravinsky tone poem and more like a mood shift. Clip-clop percussion, string bounces and nearly inaudible horn murmurs don’t help either. Finally Ornette Coleman’s over-recorded “Lonely Woman” is given an inordinately romantic reading that appears to have no improvised part and where the oboe part unfortunately resembles Mitch Miller’s saccharine contribution to BIRD WITH STRINGS.

At least Bruckmann has attempted many out-of-the-ordinary conceptions. Although too many of the compositions have overly apologetic titles, he really should express no regrets. Except for a couple of missteps, WRACK is notable modern music that does precisely what it sets out to do: bridge the gap between written and free sounds.

The situation is somewhat different on the live shows captured on PHOENIX. Perhaps because they were playing for audiences at festivals in Salzburg, Austria and Zürich, Switzerland, the four members of Pago Libre apparently took more of their music’s movement from so-called classical and ethnic sources than improv. As advanced folklore, the sounds are foot tapping and pleasant, but considering the band’s collective pedigrees it seems as if a more impressive fusion could have been attempted.

Dublin-born, Lucerne-based keyboardist John Wolf Brennan is an innovative improviser who is also a member of a Swiss composer’s group and has won awards for his notated creations. Salzburg-born, Vienna resident Tscho Theissing is principal second violinist of the Volksoper Orchestra and member of Roland Neuwirth’s Extremschrammeln. Moscow-born hornist Arkady Shilkloper was featured with the Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra and the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as improvising in a band led by Italian reedist Stefano Maltese. Bassist Daniele Patumi, born in Umbria, Italy has been a member of some of his country’s most advanced improv ensembles: Nexus and trumpeter Pino Minafra’s Sud Ensemble.

One particular frustration is Shilkloper’s four-part “Alpine Trail”. Performed mostly a cappella with throaty rubato pedal tones, despite the descriptive titles, too much of it seems to be showing off the Russian’s technical prowess rather than telling a story.

“Archaeopteryx” and “Turcana”, which also hover in the two-to-three minute mark, are similarly disappointing. The first seems merely to be a demonstration of how the basement timbres of an alperidoo -- or European version of a didjeridoo -- contrast with bird-like squeals from a violin. The later proves that a strummed bass can indeed sound like a 12-string guitar suffused with Impressionistic lines. The onomatopoeia titled “Tikkettitakkitakk” is little more than double tonguing horn lines, bass slaps, hard syncopation from the piano and some very Euro-sounding scat singing.

Even Wolf Brennan’s “Suonatina” with its dreamy, Bill Evans-style piano harmonies is too tame. It swings politely, but the meshed harmonies from slightly altered violin tones and horn resonation aren’t much more than pretty.

Shilkloper’s “Folk Song” is little more than that. A real foot tapper that molds quick tongued French horn articulation and overlaid piano polyphony into a speedy czardas-type dance, it features Theissing sliding away at the top of his range as if he’d just escaped from a Slavic wedding party. Only at the very end, though, when Patumi creates a bass line so thick that it sounds as if he’s playing an electric instrument and the fiddler plays sloppier and fast enough to vamp, does the tune transcend its origins.

Similarly when Theissing’s “Falsche faehrten” avoids musical melodrama, there are some interesting sounds on display. Somehow the introductory structured horn part morphs in cadences that resemble a whole brass band. After low frequency piano notes --, sometimes in celeste range -- alternate with feather-light horn and fiddle timbres, looser tones predominate. The syncopation is such that the band could be playing a freylach.

Fine as well is Wolf Brennan’s “Synopsis”. It subverts romantic piano accompaniment with high-intensity tremolo lines, ringing, strummed bass, sliding fiddle lines and the hornist spiting out notes so quickly that he could be playing a sprightly cornet.

“Phoenix: rising”, the (nearly) title tune, shows how various musical timbres could have been woven elsewhere on the disc. With grating alperidoo lines first displayed on top of bass thumps and prepared piano lines, the piece then opens up. A Spanish tinge from the keys meets biwa-simulating finger picks either from the bassist or violinist, as Shilkloper, now on French horn, blusters out Alpine mountain color. Soon, even the piano takes on koto-like textures, Theissing splays Balkan-like fiddle notes and the piece ends with dampened action string percussive and a few harp-like glissandos.

Had the rest of the CD showed this same interest in combing forms, PHOENIX could have been as good as WRACK. As it is, though, it will probably be of interest to followers of any of these musicians.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Wrack: Rather Dour 2. Elegy for a Boiled Frog 3. Extenuating Circumstances 4. Sins of Omission 5. Mitigating Factors 6. Gearshifts & Parenthericals 7. Lonely Woman

Personnel: Wrack: Jeb Bishop (trombone); Kyle Bruckmann (oboe, English horn); Jen Clare Paulson (viola); Kurt Johnson (bass); Tim Daisy (percussion)

Track Listing: Wrack: Phoenix: 1. Folk song 2. Karelian kink 3. Archaeopteryx 4. Turcana 5. Synopsis 6. Phoenix: rising 7. Falsche faehrten Alpine trail: 8. Calling 9. Walking 10. Dreaming 11. Dancing 12. Suonatina 13. Tikkettitakkitakk

Personnel: Phoenix: Arkady Shilkloper (flugelhorn, French horn, alphorn, alperidoo, voice); Tscho Theissing (violin, voice); John Wolf Brennan (piano, arcopiano, prepared piano, voice); Daniele Patumi (bass, voice)

March 1, 2004

BRUCKMANN/DIAZ-INFANTE/SHIURBA/STACKPOLE

grand mal
Barely Auditable/Pax Recordings bar 1234

EKG
Object 2
Locust no. 24

Teleporting in from the farthest reaches of experimentation where instrumental improvisation meets up with electrical impulses are these two sessions featuring Chicago-based double reedist Kyle Bruckmann.

A freelance modern classical musician, who plays oboe, English horn and suona or Chinese oboe, Bruckmann works with a variety of sympathetic improvisers. Connections in Chicago and beyond include cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm, percussionist Michael Zerang and saxophonist Scott Rosenberg. On GRAND MAL he’s part of a band of West Coast instrumentalists including percussionist Karen Stackpole, who has collaborated with fellow percussionist Gino Robair; electric guitarist John Shiurba, who has recorded with composer Anthony Braxton among others; and acoustic guitarist Ernesto Diaz-Infante, who plays and composes contemporary chamber music as well as improv fare. The interplay reaches exceptional heights here.

OBJECT 2 is designed for a much more limited audience. EKG -- which is also an abbreviation for electrocardiogram -- is an electro-acoustic recording of the heart. It partners the double reedist with trumpeter Ernst Karel, who has also played with such musicians as Lonberg-Holm and saxist Ken Vandermark; plus a collection of analog electronics to create an auricular meditation on a trio of inanimate objects. The resulting set of buzzes, drones and swiggles is true to the concept, but lacks listener friendliness, at least for those not attuned to buzzes and static.

Electronics also figure in the first CD, but perhaps because they arise from Shiurba’s electric guitar amp and share space with acoustic instruments, the effect isn’t as overpowering. On the nearly 11-minutes of “Retrograde amnesia”, for instance, crackling noises and an intermittent electric current -- which seems to arise from the sweep of fingers over guitar strings -- encounter bleating tones that sound like an infant’s cries. Later subtle drum pressure and single cymbal smacks give way to a steady double-reed tone, amplified and reverberated. Outer space tones are matched with guitar moans that get clamorous and insistent enough to sound like a flock of swarming bees, until the piece is finally defibrillated with diminuendo reed honks.

“Catatonic Posturing II”, features extended and elongated shrills from the double reedist amplified with electric guitar noises that meet a crescendo of electronic buzzes. Soon taking on a characteristic electronic drone, only the bell-like tones from Stackpole manage to piece the crackle and static at the end. The drummer’s scattershot percussion defines itself with louder clatters and quick movements from the standard kit, as well as whacks on unselected cymbals and what sounds like parallel glass rods on “Gray matter”. Also on hand are cello-like sweeps, perhaps created by an e-bow on Diaz-Infante’s acoustic, beats that sound like heel of hand hitting the guitar strings, and reed work encompassing extended lines and tongue slaps.

Rolling growls, bubbled notes, tonal hints of Asian music, electric guitar scrapes and squeaks, plus tones that could come from shaken maracas and sticks hit together appear on many of the other tracks. Yet, oddly enough, “Nervous tic” comes across as a curious mixture of BritImprov and avant-rockabilly. Stackpole whales away on the whole drum hit; Bruckmann pulls John Butcher-like emphasized squeals from his English horn and oboe; and the racing feedback created by the guitar(s) takes on a broken, accentuated quality, like the jagged guitar parts on “Rocket 88” by Jackie Brenston and His Delta Cats, arguably the first rock’n’roll record.

Proceeding may be coarse and rugged on OBJECT 2, though among the miasma of extended sounds you won’t hear any echoes of rock’n’roll. As a matter of fact, during the course of the six tracks you may be hard pressed to detect any acoustical instrumental tones at all.

That’s because Bruckmann and Karel are sonic explorers like London-based saxophonist Butcher, intent on using non-traditional techniques to showcase completely unexpected sounds from their horns. The result is as if the instruments are being vivisected from within. Squeaks, screeches and silence vie for audible supremacy, with purposeful microphone smacks sometimes taking the percussion function.

Otherwise, as on the second track, the output ranges from “name that sound” to what could be testing time at the radio tube factory. Initial organ-like swells soon feature higher pitched buzzing static segmented by sizzling electronic beeps. Use your imagination and you can hear waves lapping the seashore, at least until the track becomes completely still. Then a few bleated trumpet tones bring out trilling drone from the double reedist preceding the brassman creating what could be an offbeat memory of “Taps”.

Track 5, which clocks in at 12:41 -- instead of the booklet timing of 7:36 -- seems to best exemplify the ties between inanimate objects and the players. At least the manipulated electronic static strongly suggests the frayed electric cord pictured on the cover. Intermittent horn squeals and extended breaths without valve or key pressure produce minute tune shards that are added to the mix. Amid the continuous electronic drones you can hear the musicians straining as mechanized beeps take their place alongside tongue fluttering and mouthpiece kisses. When a low level alarm sound produces the mental picture of a boat leaving a harbor, breaths makes their way past the reed and the mouthpiece, propped up by wiggling electronics.

Crackling static, tone percussion and what appears to be some plastic item being bashed to record its vibrations, characterize the final track. Soon the tone of a conventional electrical current is repeatedly interrupted by other prolonged buzzes. Following oscillating movements and what could be the sound of a ray gun, a tumultuous electronic traffic jam erupts complete with blaring car horns. Dissonance snakes and shakes through the amplified electronics until the track sinks into silence.

Those interested in the experimental should definitely investigate the work of Bruckmann and these others. But realize that gratification only come with acceptance on their own terms. So come fully prepared to both discs.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: grand: 1. Catatonic Posturing I 2. Nervous tic 3. Gray matter 4. Spatial agnosia 5. The final “d” in “grand” is not pronounced 6. Big, bad 7. Retrograde amnesia 8. Shaking palsy 9. Tonic clonic 10. Catatonic Posturing II

Personnel: grand: Kyle Bruckmann (English horn, suona, oboe); Ernesto Diaz-Infante (acoustic guitar); John Shiurba (electric guitar); Karen Stackpole (percussion)

Track Listing: Object: 1. 11:16 2. 13:43 3. 05:10 4. 05.01 5. 07:36 6. 07:57

Personnel: Object: Ernst Karel (trumpet and/or analog electronics); Kyle Bruckmann (English horn, suona and/or analog electronics)

July 21, 2003

SCOTT FIELDS ENSEMBLE

From the Diary of Dog Drexel
Rossbin RS 008

Scott Fields is yet another musician interested in melting the boundaries between so-called jazz and so-called classical music.

He’s usually identified with the free music side of things through recorded and other sessions with the likes of bassist Michael Formanek, percussionist Michael Zerang, clarinetist François Houle and drummer Hamid Drake. Yet the Madison, Wis.-based guitarist also has advanced a method by which chamber ensembles like the one on this carefully designed CD can develop extended improvisations.

Seemingly a close cousin to Butch Morris’s theory of conduction, Field’s process is built on a tonal system that Stephen Dembski, a University of Wisconsin-Madison music professor, who conducts the quintet here, developed. The American Manual Alphabet and traditional conducting gestures are used by the conductor to select from melodic fragments. Then, as musicians switch between motives, the basic materials for their improvisations -- primarily 48 non-linear scales upon which the motives and gestures are built, plus the underlying feel -- also change.

What results, at least on this CD, is five examples of abstruse, unconventional chamber music. Truthfully though, the outcome doesn’t sound that dissimilar from other small group, classically oriented pieces for strings, horns and percussion developed by improvisers who haven’t advanced specially designated theories. Additionally, although all the disc’s acrimonious-sounding song titles are Fields’s -- who admits that “my porn name would be “Dog Drexel”, as are the first four compositions, this is still overall, ensemble work.

Naming his band in homage to the Art Ensemble of Chicago, the guitarist’s playing partners get the space within which to forge their own lines. Interestingly not one has much hard-core jazz background. Clarinet and alto saxophonist Guillermo Gregorio’s history of experimentation stretches from his beginnings in Buenos Aires to his present residency in Chicago. Right now he works with similar committed players like cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm and Carrie Biolo, who is also on this disc. Percussionist Biolo who has recorded the formal music of Cornelius Cardew and Anthony Braxton has also toured with eccentric guitarist Eugene Chadbourne. Another associate of Lonberg-Holm and Zerang, not to mention Gregorio, oboist and hornist Kyle Bruckmann describes himself as a freelance classical musician.

Conservatory-trained trumpeter Greg Kelley sometimes plays free jazz with veterans like saxophonist Paul Flaherty and Braxton, but spends most of his time exploring the outer limits of textures created by his horn. He has released two notable solo CDs and often performs with other Boston-centred sonic explorers like saxophonist Bhob Rainey.

Kelley’s extended technique gets a suitable showcase on “Conflicted”, its polyrhythmic texture expanded to a longer form than on the other tracks. Advancing to triple tonguing from primary tones that morph between those of a baroque piccolo trumpet and breathy intervals, the initial theme is advanced by unison clarinet and vibes. As well, Bruckmann’s English horn articulates the instrument’s standard tone, but much tarter and sharper than classical types would expect. Eventually Gregorio’s alto saxophone and Fields’s nylon-string guitar alternate long lines until a harmonic blend of most of the instruments nearly create liturgical organ chords. Staccato pitch sliding arising from horn trills, trumpet blasts and harsh electric guitar fills soon turns repetitive mirroring the title, as feedback-laden licks presage a whining horn vamp gradually dissolving into silence.

“Pissed”, the shortest -- at less than 8½ minutes -- track is also the only other piece to truly reflect its appellation. It’s noisy, with smeared splutter from the trumpeter contrasting with woodwinds’ multiphonics and some metallic tone slivers from the vibes. Then discordant electric guitar notes join with the oboe to goose the theme into a higher pitch. At this point, Kelley seems to be fully inhabiting his horn, blaring as he comes up with balloon inflation sounds that mix with unpitched percussion hocketing and rococo horn lines.

Although longer, “Bummed” and “Agitated” may revolve around a shifting tonal centre and highlight conflicting musical patterns, but by this points the smears and multiphonics have been expected, like the sound of a pooch whose bark is worse than his bite. As a matter of fact, the edgy wooden-sounding percussion, legato oboe tones and resonant Hawaiian guitar allusion on the former and quieter vibes and nylon-string plucks on the later seem to suggest unified forward motion rather than polyrhythmic exploration. The adjective “pleasant” even comes to mind. It’s almost as if what you though was a ferocious junkyard hound has been revealed as a fluffy lap dog.

Metallic as all get out, “Medicated” -- poor puppy Drexel -- while notable on its own seems to be in variance with the other tracks. Software-constructed from Ensemble solo improvisations by Gregory Taylor, the result is wiggles, whooshes, whistles and multi-tonal echoes that can probably be linked to reed blasts, tingling bells and outer- space rockabilly guitar licks. Including what appears to be tapes running backwards creating voices like David Seville’s Chipmunks, the piece builds up to electronic drones and ends with a reverberating vibe note.

Taken together the entire project is satisfying, though not outstanding. If the pseudo-electronica had been dispensed with and more emphasis put on toughening up the initial polyrhythmic invention, things would have been more striking. Right now, though, it can satisfy many -- especially those following the saga of Fields’s ever-changing Ensemble -- and suggest new interest in what else the guitarist can create as a composer.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Conflicted 2. Pissed 3. Bummed 4. Agitated 5. Medicated

Personnel: Greg Kelley (trumpet); Guillermo Gregorio (alto saxophone, clarinet); Kyle Bruckmann (oboe, English horn); Scott Fields (electric guitar, nylon-string guitar); Carrie Biolo (vibraphone, marimba, crotales, unpitched percussion); Stephen Dembski (conductor [tracks 1-4]); Gregory Taylor (used Cycling 74’s Max/MSP software to construct [track 5] from solo improvisations by each ensemble member)

February 17, 2003

KYLE BRUCKMANN/SCOTT ROSENBERG/MICHAEL ZERANG

Six Synaptics
Barely Auditable Bar 333/Ertla Creations ECC D02

Sooner or later it had to happen: peripatetic woodwind player Scott Rosenberg would have to interact with real-time electronics. Part and parcel of his leave-taking from Chicago to New York, the reedman hooked up with two of the Second City’s plethora of improvisers for this short -- about 44½ minutes -- but provocative CD.

The fact that Rosenberg, who has played free jazz with his own quartet, composed hybrid chamber music, duetted with Anthony Braxton and been featured in large ensembles has taken up the challenge facing many 21st Century musicians isn’t surprising as much as who is wielding the keyboard, dials and wires. Contemporary classical musician Kyle Bruckmann, who manipulates the minimoog and live processing here, is better known as an oboist. In that capacity he has worked with the likes of cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm and multi-keyboardist Jim Baker, with Austrian microtonalists Polwechsel, and performed works by John Cage, George Crumb and Salvatore Sciarrino as part of the Ensemble Noamnesia. Perhaps because the circuit board isn’t his main axe, he brings a singular conception and discerning execution to his contributions here.

Third man on board is veteran percussionist Michael Zerang, who since the late 1970s has participated in more off-the-wall Chicago sounds than anyone. His playing partners have ranged from fellow percussionist Hamid Drake and Lonberg-Holm to saxophonists John Butcher, Ken Vandermark and Fred Anderson. No narrow drumhead, he has also won awards for his compositions for theatre and dance productions.

Many times, in fact, it’s Zerang on hand percussion or echoing cymbals who sets the scene for these collaborations that are then advanced and shaped by Rosenberg on some combination of sopranino, alto or tenor saxophones, contrabass clarinet or flute plus Bruckmann’s implements.

On “Shards (Strewn)” for instance, the distinctive flick of sticks onto a drum head is quickly joined by gritty flute wheezes and crinkling static and whistles from the moog. The percussionist continues pumping out jagged rhythms as the synthesizer first produces calliope-type sounds than what appears to be the cry of a maddened bull. Tongue slaps and screams from inside one of the saxophones rouses the minimoog to elephant trumpeting which are then met by reed kisses. Eventually the sound field is split between whirling electronic drones and split-second flute spits.

Unselected cymbals take centrestage and continue in the aural spotlight on “Moonling”, with Zerang’s reverberating brass orbs supplying the mallet-driven rhythm. Ringing bells in the midst of a slowly intensifying electronic buzz, and later beating his toms, Zerang’s sounds encourage Rosenberg to unleash a juggernaut of Energy Music from his saxes, using his mouthpiece alone to yelp like a puppy and squeak like a mouse, while exploding into a spray of multiphonics.

Zerang’s percussion comments on the proceedings take the form of random clicks and rim clinks on “Sparks: Spewn”. Here also the live processing legerdemain asserts itself. After clearing the field with plunger tones, Bruckmann takes Rosenberg’s rolling split tone chirps and speedy flurries of nasal squeaks to double and triple the hullabaloo, having the machine’s echoing resonance create new human-sounding notes and tones.

Avoiding the excesses of so-called free jazz, New music and overbearing electronica, the three also manage to strengthen the humanity of their presentation despite the minimoog and processing. It takes a flesh-and-blood person to program and manipulates these manufactured beasts, after all. Bruckmann especially makes sure that the sound doesn’t become excessively mechanical and vapid.

As the reedist’s swan song to the Windy City, SIX SYNAPTICS leaves plenty of sounds around to be further explored by him and his Chi Town cohorts who remain there.

-- Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Gristle-Glisten 2. Knistern; Prasseln 3. Hrönir 4. Sparks: Spewn 5. Shards (Strewn) 6. Moonling

Personnel: Scott Rosenberg (sopranino, alto and tenor saxophones, contrabass clarinet, flute); Kyle Bruckmann (minimoog, live processing); Michael Zerang (multiple percussion)

December 2, 2002