Joëlle Léandre/Lotte Anker/Kresten Osgood

Refined and mature creative music, the worlds touched on here use rooted sound techniques to reach newly discovered timbral firmaments. It’s an initial recorded meeting between the French doyen of improvised double bass Joëlle Léandre and two veteran Danish improvisers, alto and tenor saxophonist Lotte Anker and drummer Kresten Osgood. Among them the three have worked with innumerable free players so that overall Worlds’ improvisations are less ad hoc than affiliated

Made up of an almost 29-minute statement and two shorter codas, the trio’s timbral variations are mostly based on interlocking the whizzing and buzzing of Léandre’s angled strokes and circular stops with Anker’s gargles, split tones and tongue slap that are often excavated from deep inside her horns’ body tubes. In fact there are sequences where the concentrated low-pitched textures from each instrument are nearly identical, making it almost impossible to distinguish one from another. Along the way the bassist occasionally launches into bouts of controlled logorrhea, adding yells, grunts and nonsense syllable rhymes to the program. Younger than the others, Osgood maintains a regularized pulse with clanks, rattles and ruffs from the drum, accented at appropriate junctures with cymbal slaps and gong clangs.

Notwithstanding the heights of dog-whistle like screeches and squeaky tightened string swipes which permeate the improvisation, the three reach a distinctive crescendo in the final sequence of “World One”. Linked by percussion slaps intermittent reed bites and thick string rubs, the  respectful  blend ascends to bellicose vocal cries, sul ponticello swipes, saxophone growls and cymbal clanks for a pugnacious and powerful climax.

Subsequent tracks emphasize harsh reed multiphonics, swabbed multi-string vibrations and drum paradiddles and pops, but those merely serve as codas to the sounds already established during the first improvisation. Overall the program affirms that the skills of a well-matched musician, even in an initial recorded meeting, can affirm the strength and suppleness of group improvisations.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing:1. World One 2. World Two 3. World Three

Personnel: Lotte Anker (alto and tenor saxophones); Joëlle Léandre (bass and voice) and Kresten Osgood (drums)