UK percussionist and electronic artist Trevor Taylor's Circuit project in an extended electroacoustic version with Jon Seagroat on reeds & electronics, Tim Chatzigiannis on computer & electronics, Mathew Hutchinson on piano, Paul Medley on reeds, and Philipp Wachsmann on violin & electronics, in carefully controlled and sublimely detailed improvisation.

The counterpart to the Dunmall session "Seascapes" recorded at the same Victoria Rooms at the University of Bristol's music department, this quartet sees Dunmall on soprano sax and flute joined by three string players--Benedict Taylor on viola, Ashley John Long on bass, and guitarist Phil Gibbs--for six detailed collective improvisations leaning toward chamber jazz.

The second album from the trio of Ferran Fages (acoustic turntable), Ruth Barberan (trumpet), and Alfredo Costa Monteiro (accordion) expands on their first "Atolon" album with these two recordings of intense electroacoustic improvisation, a mixture of ritual, controlled chaos, mysterious and often disruptively provocative sound, and other inexplicable evolutions.

A composite of environmental sounds, electronics, and viola, recorded in Barcelona, Spain and Lisbon, Portugal from intrepid audio explorers Ferran Fages and Ernesto Rodrigues, the single long work taking the listener on a theoretical journey of transparent traffic, squealing wheels and indeterminate location, engrossing in its detail and the mystery it presents.

Violinist Mira Benjamin requested British composer James Weeks write a long-duration piece for her, Weeks evoking the image of a violin alone in a remote hill played only by the wind, using an evolving palette of timbral and harmonic material resolving with long sequences of Just Intonation three-part chords, Benjamin also whistling and singing softly.

Recording in Saskatoon in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan the day before their performance at the Sounds Like Festival, audio explorer Tim Olive brings his magnetic pickups in a first meeting with Doreen Girard performing on a prepared tsymbaly, a Ukranian hammer dulcimer, for a single, unusually evolving, and wonderfully rich improvisation.

Fellow Canadians, Montreal's Ambiances Magnetiques collective member, turntablist and electronics artist Martin Tetrault meets Japan-based electronic explorer Tim Olive performing on magnetic pickups, in their first album despite having performed sporadically across three decades: 4 rich improvisations minimally edited, shaping sound in compelling ways.

Antoine Beuger's piece merges compositional and improvised approaches, drawing on the text "the memories of RN", as he performs on flute, voice and objects with the electroacoustic improvising ensemble Colectivo maDam, merging long instrumental phrases with words, syllables or letters, using space and detachment to create numerous possibilities to resonate.

Several of late Swiss composer Hans-Jurg Meier's works are performed in duo, trio and quartet settings, whose compositions merged baroque forms with translations of architecture, «qEndeavoring to make physically tangible the sensual qualities of the musical material (tones, intervals, texture) while exploring the interaction of nature, form and beauty.

When the Zeitkratzer Ensemble was asked to perform a late ensemble work by John Cage, director Reinhold Friedl turned to composer Burkhard Schlothauer, who reworked one of Cage's Number Pieces to create this rich piece using Cage's methods; plus a composition for the dance piece "Bewegte Bauhausbilder"; and an octet commissioned for the Klangzeit-Festival Time Is On My Side.

Two works from German composer Andre O. Moller: 9 Dances for Natalie Bohrer, a visual artist and painter, in a work deriving pitches and durations from a transformation of numbers, using Christoph Schiller's album "spinet" as sources; and "ungerarde" exploring pitch relations from a recording of radio static with durations in a proportional canon structure.

Chicago saxophonist Gerrit Hatcher sees his solo saxophone performances as a format that can be both charismatic and alienating in to the listener, as he uses extreme technique and powerful streams of emotional playing in a set of improvisations: "Salt Dome" parts 1-3, and "Cooking Fuel", each wrought with frailty and bluster; impressive work.

Taking their name from plants whose seeds are distributed by wind, violist Frantz Loriot and bassist Daniel Studer formed Anemochore in 2016 to purse different playing techniques and preparations in their search for unique forms of improvisation, here with drummer Benjamin Brodbeck and saxophonist & bass clarinetist Sebastian Strinning, recorded by Jean-Marc Foussat.

Portuguese guitarist and experiementer Abdul Moimeme, once a student of US free jazz saxophonist Patrick Brennan, now joins him as Moimeme employs two electroacoustically altered guitars played simultaneously with objects, Brennan performing on sax and cornet, as they create unusual and assertive abstract sonic environments, intensely detailed and gripping.

Turning the piano trio concept onto its sonic side, the Swedish trio of Nina de Heney on double bass, Karin Johansson on piano, and Henrik Wartel on drums owe more to AMM than jazz tradition, as they use extended techniques and a sound-oriented approach to improvisation, presenting three live recordings at Elementstudion, in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Clarinetist Tom Jackson, guitarist Daniel Thompson and drummer Vid Drasler met in 2016 as part of the CRAM Records residency at FriForma in Ljubljana, at which time they performed and recorded as a trio, vowing to collaborate again; this album of open-minded free improvisation is the result: "Nauportus" in 5 parts, ebbing and flowing from near silence to animated interaction.

Joing Portuguese and Spanish improvisers for four recordings in Bilbao, Spain, this sextet presents sound works using unusual orchestration--piano harp, viola, guitar, metals, electric organ, paper, contact mics, and electronics--balancing spacious exploration with assertive moments of percussive and caustic sound, evolving bold sonic and timbral combinations.

Recording at the 12th CreativeFest at O'Culto da Ajuda, in Lisbon, Portugal, the IKB ensemble is represented by 20 musicians for this performance, merging acoustic and electronic instruments including strings, brass, winds, self-made instruments, and percussion in a concert of intense constraint & patience, seething with detail and replete with consummate skill.

A fascinating confluence of improvisation and contemporary compositional approaches from this Spanish ensemble led by composer and drummer Nasim Lopez Palacios, using 5 reeds, trumpet, flute, piano, electric guitar, harp, double bass, drums and electronics in an extended work exploring space, tension and motion, with a beautiful build to catharsis.

The Lisbon String Trio of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Miguel Mira on cello, and Alvaro Rosso on contrabass continue their recent string of collaborations with a fourth player, Portuguese tuba player Gil Goncalves joining to addd a unique complement to their strings, as Goncalves adds bass, blats, growls and unique timbres of upper register low brass.

Recording in New York at the Omi International Arts Center in 2018, the duo of German trumpeter Nikolaus Neuser and Brazilian bassist Carlos Eduardo Quebrada Vasquez, Quebrada expanding his bass through electronics, capture an inventive and active set of dialogs, rich in technical skill and continually surprising through twists and turns; action-packed and inspired.

Far ranging free improvisation from the Sao Paulo, Brazil quartet of Jorge Nuno on guitar, Romulo Alexis on trumpet, Vitor Vieira Branco on vibraphone, and Rafael Cab on drums, in ethnically rich and spiritual playing that incorporates beautiful atmospheric work, ruminating assertive playing, and idiosyncratic interaction with unusual technique and percussive instruments.

"Ecorchure" translates to a skin wound produced by a violent friction that removes or tears the superficial layers; here the French trio of Jean-Luc Petit on saxophones, Jeremy Baysse on electric guitar & gadgets, and Fabrice Favriou on drums, tear through three excoriating improvisations during a 2019 live concert at Ateliers Musicaux Syrinx, in Poitiers France.

Schwarm, or "Swarm", 13 is a German ensemble performing instant compositions, directed by clarinetist Rudi Debrunner and saxophonist Max Stehle, who also provides conceptions for the band, which is comprised of reeds, guitar, violin, viola, cello, piano, percussion, double bass, and voice, presenting (appropriately) 13 improvisations captured live at Studioboerne45.

The Portuguese large improvising ensemble String Theory is heard live during the CreativeFest#12, at O'Culto da Ajuda, in Lisbon, Portugal in 2018, in an extended improvisation of incredible layering and restraint, making an amalgam of mostly acoustic string sources sound electronic and hallucinatory, an incredible achievement in string sonics.

2nd volume of bassist Carl Testa's Sway electroacoustic interactive software, taking the individual playing of Erica Dicker on violin, Junko Fujiwara on cello, Louis Guarino Jr. on trumpet, Andria Nicodemou on vibraphone, Carl Testa on bass & electronics, and Anne Rhodes on voice, Testa's software generating responses that push and pull the musician in unique directions.

After a NY session for a Giuseppe Logan album, guitarist Ed Pettersen and pianist & instrument builder Cooper-Moore recorded their own acoustic quartet with Cooper-Moore on piano, then headed to Nashville to record acoustic and electric improv sets, then finally this gospel set with "Reverend Eddie Bones", all presented on 3 CDs in a keepsake tin in a printed cloth bag.

A subtle album of acoustic interaction recorded at Berlin's Noiseberg from the quartet of Miriam den Boer Salmon on violin, Ernesto Rodrigues on viola & zither, Fredrik Rasten on acoustic guitar, and Guilherme Rodrigues on cello & percussion, sounding almost electronic in their frictional technique and harmonic overtones, ebbing and flowing from active interaction to tranquil discourse.

Swedish conceptual artist Leif Elggren developed this second album in his trilogy using "The Motor", a soundwork that he's built over many years from basic fragments of sound used in installations and performances, aggregated here in an expanded form as a continuous drone, harsh on the surface but complex in its layers and sonic collisions.

Two sets across two nights during CreativeFest #12 at O'Culto da Ajuda, in Lisbon, Portugal, in a septet of six acoustic sources--viola, cellos, flute, trumpet, piano and percussion--and electronics, an extended journey approached with quiet tension and incredible detail, the recording of the first set used as the basis for the 2nd to create a virtual ensemble.

An eruption of sound from the long-standing collaboration of violist Ernesto Rodrigues and Abdul Moimeme, here on prepared electric guitar, in a trio with unique percussionist Antez, whose intimate relationship with the percussive objects he uses creates a tectonic aural range of explosive flows and deeply churning cymbal vibration, caught live at Lisboa Incomum, in Lisbon.

The fourth release from the Portuguese lowercase electroacoustic ensemble Suspensao, merging viola, cello, bass clarinet, alto sax, electric guitar, piano, double bass, percussion and electronics in intensely detailed, slow moving improvisation, revealing impressive tension and suspension of time in impeccably concentrative collective conversation.

Thirteen emphatic "rituals" from the Argentinian duo of saxophonist Hernan Sama, recording in the studio as they employ an array of techniques including extended bowing and plucking approaches, saxophone smears, growls, vocal utterances, odd reed techniques, &c, to engage their listener's ears as they unfold dialog that merges jazz forms and fully free improvisation.

A single extended improvisation from the trio of Udo Schindler on reeds, brass & analogue synthesizer, Gunnar Geisse on laptopguitar & virtual instruments, and Anton Kaun on electronics, zeug & effects recorded live at Das Lihotzky/wagnis ART, in Munchen, Germany in 2017, a journey of odd intent, brilliant technique, eccentric attitude, and unorthodox dialog.

Fred Frith's solo performances are amongst some of his most fascinating, and this live album at Ateliers Claus in Brussels, 2018 does not disappoint, Frith using every inch of his guitar and an arsenal of objects, in tandem with his masterful creative intent, to present an extended and fascinating journey in sound, remarkable in its breadth and bold inventive power.

The improvising string duo of stalwart London improvisers, Daniel Thompson on acoustic guitar and Phil Durrant on the octave mandola, are heard in two settings of texturally rich, intricate interactions, first at Cafe OTO in 2022 for an extended improvisation, then at Cable Street Studios two months later for six succint, impressively diverse dialogs.

Thirteen emphatic "rituals" from the Argentinian duo of saxophonist Hernan Sama, recording in the studio as they employ an array of techniques including extended bowing and plucking approaches, saxophone smears, growls, vocal utterances, odd reed techniques, &c, to engage their listener's ears as they unfold dialog that merges jazz forms and fully free improvisation.