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unsounds 10
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Cor Fuhler and Rhodri Davies use extreme preparations and processes to reinvent the large arrays on strings on piano and harp respectively while Thomas Lehn removes a vintage analog synth from its comfort zone and John Butcher draws strict geometric patterns with the blood of a saxophone. There is a sinister precision and unrelenting anti-expressiveness to each of these four virtuoso's style and to have them playing together is nearly oppressive in its density of intrigue. At the core of the monumental compatibility between these musicians is their desire to sustain a narrow range of thematic focus for extended passages instead of rapidly shifting themes in the manner of older improv paradigms. At the same time, they often resist the cliches of stasis and continuity established for electroacoustic improvisation in recent years, preferring instead to install complicated, abrasive events on their musical surfaces. Allow me to christen this music as Textures With Twitters, and call attention to the fantastic recent Rives/Matthews/Zach/Dubost release (Dining Room Music) that I feel is similar in concept and quality. These works signal a new chapter in free improvisation in which the acoustic-instrument-as-electronics illusion is no longer an end in itself, but rather a means to suppressing the parts in terrifying or otherworldly sonic sums that creep across a detemporalized canvas. This is passive aggression with fierce new timbres, raised to the fourth power. Michael Anton Parker, Downtown Music Gallery | |
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John
Butcher - tenor and soprano saxophone
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