Schick/Turlinckx/Zoepf

A textbook example of in-the-moment electro-acoustic improvising, Ensemble A’s two extended live tracks are subtle, strident, solid and smart in equal measure. No surprise since the trio members have extensive experience in the genre. Berlin-based Ignaz Schick who plays turntable and sampler has recorded with everyone from Douglas Ewart to Franz Hautzinger. Fellow German, bass clarinetist and soprano saxophonist Joachim Zoepf has worked with Erhard Hirt and Micel Doneda as well as regularly in solo, situations, while Brussels-born, Berlin-based pianist Anaïs Tuerlinckx has recorded with Burkhard Beins.

Although designed to experiment with each of Schick’s instruments in turn, to be honest the results aren’t that different sounding. Crackling, whooshing, chiming and buzzing textures are projected at various degrees of tempos and pitches, though perhaps there’s more noisy cacophony when the turntable is involved. Tuerlinckx’s piano preparations take the form of keyboard clips and jabs, stopped key shudders, inner string strums and rebounds and pivot to full length pressurized smacks.

As the singular piano tones and reverb evolve in tandem with programmed scrunches and scrapes, static drones  and whistling mechanized samples on the bottom, Zoepf interjects shuddering bass clarinet scoops or thinning soprano saxophone peeps. At the same time these trills and strains add an elevated layer to the existing unity, especially during those sections where the low pitches widen and become less stable. There’s even a point on “Turntableturn” where a brief reed motif introduces a rare horizontal line, adding an unexpected melodic motif to  the thundering and snoring dissident upsurges that characterize the other trio members’ playing.

With some broken octave motifs as speedy as others are leisurely and while uniting with logical movement timbral differences and experiments, Ensemble A’s members’ expertise lies in exposing the musical journey’s mechanics, not fastening on a definite finale. Many will want to go along with them.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Electroacoustic Kaleidoscope 2.

Turntableturn

Personnel: Joachim Zoepf (bass clarinet and soprano saxophone); Anaïs Tuerlinckx (prepared piano) and Ignaz Schick (turntable and sampler)