This is the first album of this trio with my homeland musicians. The music balances in between impro and composed, between heavy and beautiful, between jazz and whatever… I’v been playing most of these tunes with different ensembles of mine during the last 6 years, but they have never been released for different reasons. I realised - to be able to move on you really have to finish your unfinished work… Here it is. Enjoy! Liudas Mockûnas
Limited edition vinyl release only
The electrified acoustic trio combines several worlds. Stories are told here in the jazz idiom: starting from a basic groove is stressed about this and also improvises with nesting and rhythmic themes. The compositions are mainly played on scales from division of the octave harmonic structures and parallelisms, scales, supposedly inspired by such contrasting worlds as well as the oriental Maqamwelt of natural horns in the Alps region. The trio moves also because of the natural inclusion of electronica outside "world music" sound is ethnocentric and exoticism of the young new century - in which bits and bytes a supporting role-play required. The clash of purely electronic and acoustic sounds of the trio receives a new topicality and urgency.
Upcoming Hurricane is a new group in a traditional form, a particular concatenation of musicians that gelled with remarkable speed and which brings its own strong personality to the idea of the piano trio. It has a layered rhythmic dynamism that comes directly from the tradition and the exploding, unfettered energy of free improvisation. It was the young bassist Pascal Niggenkemper’s idea to put together this band with the brilliant veterans Simon Nabatov and Gerald Cleaver, and it’s a sign of both Niggenkemper’s skills and his prescience that the group possesses the depth, vitality and vision that it does. Stuart Broomer
A never earlier released duo recording that was played back in 1987 at Kassiopeia, Wuppertal brings these two great musicians and composers together for this unique and unforgettable session.
Violinist Billy Bang made his recording debut as a leader with the Survival Ensemble, the first working band he ever led, on New York Collage in 1979. Bang, saxophonists Bilal Abdur Rahman and Henry Warner, bassist William Parker, and percussionists Rashid Bakr and Khuwana John Fuller played incendiary free jazz more clearly indebted to the New York avant-garde of the preceding decade than any album Bang would record again. The music’s urgency and passion arose from the exhilaration of artistic self-discovery shared by everyone in the group, and the intensity of their need to express their feelings. The albums really are a loft era classic. Proudly flaunting its New York roots, it insists that music based on the innovations of Coltrane, Ayler, Taylor, could grow in new directions, absorb new influences, and engage contemporary political realities. Ed Hazell
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The TARFALA TRIO has its roots from 1992, meeting at the SOLO - 92 festival in Stockholm, Sweden. After that first encounter in 1992, the trio has worked sporadically and played festivals in Europe and releasing 2 Cds on Maya Recordings. This recording captures them playing live in Belgium, 2009. It is explosive, high energy loaded ferocious music focusing on low dynamic melodic material. Tarfala Trio is at their peak creating the most exciting improvised music you can hear today. This is a double limited gatefold vinyl edition only, which, as a bonus, contains one-sided 7“ EP and a booklet of photos of the musicians playing live.
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RED trio made a stunning debut in 2010. In this second album they play with British music veteran John Butcher pushing musical boundaries to the new realms of gripping and exciting kingdom of free improvisation. Limited edition vinyl release only.
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This is a monster duo! One of the greatest duo events of all time. There were a series of weekly duo encounters with William Hooker and different saxists at Jerome Cooper's loft during the summer in the early nineties. I caught two of these with Louie Belogenis and Thomas Chapin and both were incredible. I recall that Louie and Thomas were pushed even further than usual by William's colossal drumming. Both Louie & Thomas mentioned that William made them dig deep into their souls for two sets each to come up with enough ideas to last through these two encounters. This recording captures the night with Thomas Chapin and William Hooker in all their glory.. Bruce Lee Gallanter Downtown Music Gallery
Thomas Heberer is called “a European master” and “new trumpet genius”. The music in his new double LP brings a fresh approach to blending improvisation and composition, which allows for the highest amount of freedom on the musicians' side while incorporating significant structural tools on the composer's side as well. His solo recording applies a vast variety of conventional and extended techniques, among which the most distinctive component is the exclusive use of circular breathing.
Over the past few years I have become increasingly more interested in developing a personal sonic language on the guitar, in an attempt to be able to do things I have been hearing, which were not possible though standard ways of playing the guitar. As I continue to consider directions in sound, it was, and still is, very important to me to maintain the link to my roots and interests in the traditional aspects of improvised performance. This recording captures a moment of synthesis of those two worlds, that of sound creation intermingled with a loosely traditional style of trio improvisation, something I was hoping I could realize and present to the public. Terrence McManus
The beauty of a short story, of course, is that it can be taken in at a sitting, indeed is so structured and formulated that it represents a single, continuous verbal performance, unlike the episodic or architectural structure of a long novel. It is, to that extent, a form that lends itself rather well to musical analogies, though not at first glance to improvised music, which tends to subordinate artful structure to moment-by-moment invention. And yet the greatest short stories can often seem improvised: brief, epiphanic flashes where the next step and the eventual outcome remain in doubt to the very end. Brian Morton
