Violinist Guido Del Fabbro in a 5-piece work with violin, voice, electronics and synthesizer, blending compositional and electroacoustic principles for an unusual, rich, and thoroughly modern album.

Michel Gonneville's dreamlike, shamanistic journey, "Hozhro", in a brilliantly executed reading by Montreal's Quatuori Bozzini with vocalist Marianne Lamber & saxophonist Mathieu Gualin.

The Fence: about borders and fences all over the world, using long amplified strings and voices; Bagni di Dolabella: a violinists guide to the treatments and political intrigues of an ancient roman bath.

ist (The Improvising String Trio) of Rhodri Davies (harp), Simon H. Fell (bass) and Mark Wastell (violincello) performing at The Natural Music Club in London, 1997, using unorthodox techniques in indeterminate systems and free improvisation for fascinating results.

Taking their band name from an Ornette Coleman album, this European quintet presents new compositions in the style of Ornette, Archie Shepp, Pharoah Sanders and John Carter, ecstatic free jazz with a hard bop foundation, extended with modern technique and experience.

The Bozzini Quartet commissioned this work from the duo Derome/Hetu, which tackles the subject of making differences cohabit, calling for the musicians to move & improvise in response to a soundtrack in 4 languages.

An hallucinogenic and commanding blending of improvisation, song, spoken word, and tonal/timbral music from double bassist Christian Meaas Svendsen's Filosofer, creating beautiful sonic environments out of which voice and message emerge and submerge, buoyed by a string quartet (two violins and two double basses), computers, turntables, synths and samplers.

Morton Feldman's final composition, originally premiered in 1987, here performed by pianist Mark Knoop, violinist Aisha Orazbayeva, violist Bridget Carey, and cellist Anton Lukoszevieze, recording a year after their successful performance at London's Cafe Oto, maintaining focus and concentration on this large, unhurried work of micro-variations.

Three string improvisers--Ulrike Brand on cello, Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, and Olaf Rupp on electric guitar--approach their instruments from all angles excepting the most traditional ones, from scraping and granulating to creating resonant sonic environments, an apt reflection of a journeying musician, enhanced by text and images in the CD package.

String Theory was formed as the string section for Boston's Leap of Faith Orchestra, the core being David Peck on reeds, game calls, fog horn, sirens, &c, and Glynis Lomon on cello, aquasonic and voice, with Jane Wang (cello) and Mimi Rabson (violin), creating a wonderfully assertive and somewhat skewed approach to improvisation, captured live at Mobius in Cambridge, 2016.

A sense of both lightness and weight drawn from Portuguese viola player's Ernesto Rodrigues' 18-piece String Theory, in a large and detailed improvisation using an incredible array of string sources, including viola, harp, violin, cello, viola da gamba, double bass, classical, acoustic and 12-string guitars, mandolin, zither, harpsichord, and piano.

The late American violinist Billy Bang's first album, originally issued on Hat Hut Records, is reissued with an additional track, plus 4 previously unissued solo tracks recorded in Tilberg, Netherland in 1978, demonstrating this great artist's broad range of innovative techniques, mixing free-form and melodic passages in extended and joyful improvisations.

Double Bassist Mark Dresser, a mainstay of the Downtown NY scene as an improviser and composer, and also prominent on the US West Coast and as an international touring artist, releases a powerful album of distinctive solo playing, both technically and melodically, with 2 tracks caught live at the Umea Jazz Festival and others recorded at the University of California, San Diego.

Recording in the rich resonant structure of the Church of Gauriac, in Gironde, France, Italian reedist Ugo Boscain on contrabass clarinet and French double bassist Fred Marty explore the lower registers in five dialogs of an album titled for "ecstasi" (ecstasy), using a wealth of creative approaches and insane technique, from reserved to spirited forays.

Phil Minton started as a trumpeter and became one of free improv's most outside vocalists; Joelle Leandre is a double bassist who also performs free vocal improv; this is their first recorded collaboration, and it's an unusual and wonderful album of heavy tone improvisation, plucked and bowed, and a masterfully odd free association of vocalisation.

NY free jazz drummer and composer Harris Eisenstadt brings his talents to the compositional world with this four movement suite performed by the Mivos Quartet of Olivia De Prato, Josh Modney, Victor Lowrie and Mariel Roberts, a creative composition blending melodic and textural approaches to the strings in a bold rendering of Eisenstandt's work.

Anthony Pateras performs on pipe organ alongside Erkki Veltheim on electric violin, presenting a single extended work joining both instruments as a unified timbral force, producing exquisite and hypnotic sensorial phenomena over 50 minutes, as the duo investigate spectral phenomena in sound; includes a 24 page illuminating booklet interviewing both artists.

Pianist Aki Takase and violinist Ayumi Paul's 1st collaboration is an 18 movement suite for violin and piano blending composition and improvisation, with 11 movements from Takase and 5 written with Paul, plus Mozart's "K. 1 minuet in G major" and the Preludio movement from Bach's solo violin partita in E major; an absorbing set of recordings inspired by the writings of Thomas Mann.

"Farhadian is an American composer and performer with a base in San Francisco and one in Berlin. Her work often is about connecting solo violin and interactive electronics. Combining her classical background as violist (Berkeley Symphon...

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"Determined to prove a point. Swedish double bass player Vilhelm Bromander, known from Jonas Kullhammar's The New Kids On The Rock quartet and the more experimental The Agg, as well as his collaborations with pianists Sten Sandell and K...

"A similar grounding of sound in silence characterizes Layering Time [cs435], an austerely beautiful piece for piano, field recording and viola by Eva-Maria Houben in collaboration with Rodrigues. Houben, who plays piano and provides a ...

"[...] Blattwerk's two torrents of strings move like a waveform, cresting and dipping in volume and intensity. The quintet features an unusual line-up-violin, viola, two cellos, and Trilla's drums-and shifts between an indeterminate wor...

Portugal's Lisbon String Trio with Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Miguel Mira on cello, and Alvaro Rosso on double bass, in a series of releases adding one additional improviser, here joined by Etienne Brunet on soprano saxophone, for two extended improvisations of active counterpoint and beautiful open sections, an excellent and rousing collaboration.

The 4th collaboration for Portugal's Lisbon String Trio of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Miguel Mira on cello, and Alvaro Rosso on double bass, with Brazilian clarinetist based in Barcelona Luiz Rocha, all captured live at Casa dos Bicos, Fundacao Jose Saramago, in Lisbon in 2017 for free improvisation that maintains a calm center amidst seething and commanding playing.

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Drawing its name from the seven members making up this string ensemble led by violist Ernesto Rodrigues, String Theory complements the concurrent Lisbon String Trio albums by magnifying concepts in freely improvised string interactions, using unusual harmonics, melodic and percussive approaches to instruments, and quickly moving quietly intense interaction.

Solo double-bass improvisations from Mostly Other People Do the Killing bassist and leader Moppa Elliot, consisting of sequences of contrasting themes, or musical cubism in the spirit of Picasso and Braque, presenting 7 of 14 sequences where the improvisation is a series of disparate musical ideas that transition rapidly in an attempt to disrupt the linear progression of thematic development.

Four fascinating compositions by Pascale Criton exploring microtonalities on instruments tuned in 1/16th tone (violin, viola, guitar) based on gestural processes developed in close collaboration with the musicians: one duo with Silvia Tarozzi and Deborah Walker, one solo piece with Deborah Walker, and two pieces performed by Dedalus Ensemble.

NY Composer and Zs founder Alex Mincek's first release since 2011 also launches Sound American's Young Composer Portrait series, presenting 4 chamber works--"Pendulum VII"; selected movements from "Harmonielehre"; "Pneuma"; and "Torrent"--performed by Wet Ink Ensemble, Mivos Quartet, and Yarn/Wire, in a deluxe hardcover book package with interviews and notes.

Trombonist Jeb Bishop and North Carolina-based Out & Gone Collective member, violist Dan Ruccia, after touring and performing with Eugene Chadbourne, Dan Lilley, and David Menestres, found their sound so compatible that they recorded this duo album using the languages of free jazz, chamber music, and extended improvisations to create something unexpected and rare.

Like the Lisbon String Trio, this trio explores strings in a viola, cello and double bass trio configuration, from Creative Sources core players Ernesto Rodrigues, Guilherme Rodrigues, and Alexander Frangenheim, exploring a classic trio concept towards new expressions and boundaries, through spritely interaction and sonic expedition.

Violinist Gerszewski developed an individual form of notation to create his "ordinary music", a continuation of abstract visual thinking by means of sound.

Sounding almost electric through unique string manipulations and harmonic overtones and inside playing on the piano, the quartet of Ernesto Rordigues on viola, Guilherme Rodrigues on cello, Biliana Voutchkova on violin and pianist Magda Mayas render an eerie and atmospheric examination of trees, the self, blindness, and other obscure topics through cautious and slow-moving improvisation.

A beautiful album of darkly lyrical jazz duos from Israeli saxophonist and bass clarinetist Albert Beger and collaborator and member of the Albert Beger Quartet Shay Hazan, on double bass and guimbri, for seven pieces recorded in the studio: 6 improvised works and the composed piece "Cycles".

Porto bassist Miguel Angelo's solo release is an album of pure improvisation, unrepeatable takes, which, for the artist, makes musical and emotional sense as a satisfying moment of musical sensation, through 11 tracks on the double bass of powerful playing, creative impulse, lyrical and rhythmic inventiveness, and ultimately, great satisfaction.

Quebec improvisers Pierre-Yves Martel on Viola da Gamba, objects, and feedback, Eric Normand on electric bass and snare drum, are joined by Berlin pianist Magda Mayas for two extended works of free improvisation, manipulating and contorting strings with an electroacoustic edge, dark ruminations of exquisite detail, patience, and adroit interaction.

"We've written about Frangenheim before, whether playing solo, as on "The Knife Again", or in duo with trumpeter Natsuki Tamura on "Nax". On "Talk For A Listener", he goes far beyond conventions, getting rid of any foothold 'a listener"...

Double double bass from the duo of John Edwards and Olie Brice performing live at Iklectik Arts Lab, in London in 2017, a return of sorts as Brice's first live improv gig was opening for the Sunny Murray Trio with Edwards and Bevan; here the two combine, in contrast and confluence as they demonstrate massive technique and concentrative conversation.

An absolutely phenomenal example of free improvisation, both on cello and on voice, from French improviser Didier Petite performing live at La Plantation, in Beijing, China in 2016, showing profoundly great skill, a fount of creative impulse and ideas, and wonderfully idiosyncratic vocals and songs to accompany himself; an inspiring and delightful record.

Hubert Zemler is a classically educated percussionist who works with both symphony orchestras and improv, here performing 3 works, his own 4-part "Pupation of Dissonance", revealing an incredible knowledge and exultation in approaches to solo percussion, alongside Steve Reich's "Music for Pieces of Wood" and Per Norgard's study in drifting pulses and overlapping accents, "Waves".

Five works for harp and voice from composer Eva-Maria Houben and soprano Tatiana Kuzina, opening with a lovely "Aeolian Harp", and including two works from her "Voice and Piano" album recorded for harp--"Adagio" in 3 movements, and "Songs for the Island" in 5 movements--alongside "Hatid" and "Two Songs with Piano" in two movements.

"Deep" is the word, as two Swedish improvisers--bass and contrabass clarinetist Christer Bothen, a member of Fire! Orchestra and Mats Gustafsson's Nu Ensemble, and double bassist Vilhelm Bromander, a peer of Axel Dorner, Sten Sandell, Raymond Strid, &c.--formed the duo "CBVB" to explore the possibilities of their big instruments, heard in this 6 movement, profound suite.

Buenos Aires double bassist Pablo Vazquez presents nine solo improvisations using an impressive and diverse set of approaches to the instrument, utilizing every inch of the bass to evoke the supernatural beings of Argentine popular culture, in an imaginative approach to sonic narrative that demonstrates powerful control and masterful technique.

Two bass players--European free improv legend Barre Phillips and Japanese master Motoharu Yoshizawa--met at Cafe Amores in Yamaguchi, Japan in 1994, with Phillips on an amplified acoustic upright and Yoshizawa using an electric vertical 5-string bass of his own design, as the two weave and merge their unique sounds and approaches in a brilliant concert.

Two bass players--European free improv legend Barre Phillips and Japanese master Motoharu Yoshizawa--met at Cafe Amores in Yamaguchi, Japan in 1994, with Phillips on an amplified acoustic upright and Yoshizawa using an electric vertical 5-string bass of his own design, as the two weave and merge their unique sounds and approaches in a brilliant concert.

A proper reissue of the 1976 Incus album from guitarist Derek Bailey and cellist Tristan Honsinger, primarily from a live concert at at Verity's Place in London on February 7, 1976, with two unusual studio recordings punctuating the album, an early example of their long history of collaboration and a great example of their intense, joyful, and truly free improvisation together.

The Canadian Council for the Arts commissioned this work by Hungarian composer Gyula Csapo, a student of Morton Feldman amd John Cage, realized by Montreal's Quatuor Bozzini quartet, "Deja? Koja?" meaning "Already? Where to?" is a three-part work with two intermissions, an epic work that references the same basic materials in a variety of perspectives.

The acoustic bass duo of New Yorker Sean Ali and European Pascal Niggenkemper use unusual techniques and preparations for the large double bass to make a series of 22 concise, diverse, and engaging improvisations.

A live recording at O'Culto da Ajuda, Lisbon, during the 2017 CreativeFest #11 from the quartet of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Guilherme Rodrigues on cello, Gianna de Toni on double bass, and Vasco Trilla on percussion, a sinuous, curving extended improvisation of subtle shades, with certain rotations more forceful, but always gravitating to quietude.

Bridging folk traditions with modern aesthetics, the duo of Evan Baker on guitar and Austin Glover on violin, both contributing songs, sing about everyday events, music, and life, the songs having a bluesy and even early Kinks feel at times, made unique through a cappella moments and languid instrumental sections.

The Creative Sources core string improvisers of violist Ernesto Rodrigues, cellist Guilherme Rodrigues, cellist Miguel Mira, and double bassist Alvaro Rosso, with frequent collaborator percussionist Vasco Trilla, are joined by German violinist Harald Kimmig (Trio Kimmig) for a dynamic album that fluctuates from acoustic lowercase to rapid pointillistic improv.

Two string players, Swedish acoustic guitarist and banjo player Niklas Fite, and German double bassist Alexander Frangenheim, recording in the studio in Berlin in 2017 for 10 succinct improvisations ranging from quick interactive discourse of a pointillistic nature to near silent meditations using unusual and extended techniques, a quirky and informed album.

Emulating the sounds and intentions of cranes through string improvisation and unusual techniques, the quartet of Estonian violinist Elo Masing, German violinist Dietrich Petzold, and Portuguese violist and cellist Ernesto and Guilherme Rodrigues name each of 8 tracks on the behavior of cranes, from forming a flock, migration, fighting, ritual dancing, to nesting.

A lowercase duo of intense focus and concentrative dialog from Creative Sources label leader Eernesto Rodrigues on viola and trombonist Eduardo Chagas, a member of IKB, Variable Geometry Orchestra, Suspensao, &c., through five recordings using primarily extended techniques and close proximity miking to create unusual textural and alien soundcscapes of great tension and release.

Lisbon-based viola player Ernesto Rodrigues joins three Berlin-based musicians--cellist Guilherme Rodrigues, double bassist Andrew Lafkas and electronics artist Bryan Eubanks--merging the lowercase approaches of Creative Sources groupings with experimental electronics for a 5-part album that ranges from the subliminal to assertive tones and momentum.

Swedish double bassist Johan Moir, who focuses on extended techniques, preparations, Just Intonation and psychoacoustic phenomena, joins with cellist Guilherme Rodrigues in the studio in Berlin to record these 9 dialogs of haunting string improvisations, pushing the limits of their "hollow wood" instruments to create a vast palette of sound and approaches.

P (Yann Pittard on oud and guitar & vocals), Y (Tatsuya Yoshida on drums & vocals) and N (Mitsuru Nasuno on bass & vocals) performing Arabian Progressive Pop Improvisation, an unusual melding and orchestration of arabic progressions and melodic prog rock.

Issuing on CD the duo album of violinist Samara Lubelski and guitarist Bill Nace, originally released on Nace's Open Mouth label early in 2018, presenting a series of psychedelic textural works, Lubelski creating vibrant and reiterating structures that Nace uses as a foundation for swells and expressive emanations; hypnotic and mesmerizing.

Marianne Schuppe continues to reimagine songs and their relation to tone and melody, here in a series of 11 songs realized with voice, lute, and uber bows, creating delicate accompaniment to her lucid movements between pure sound and words, singing and speaking her lyrics of succinct phrases rich in subtle intimation and evocative imagery; beautiful.

A series of unusual compositions originally written by Jacques Demmiere and Vincent Barras, here reworked by Demmiere and violinist Anouck Genthon, each piece focusing on sounds, breaths, frictions, silences, vowels and consonants, weaving and complementing each other through a mix of traditional, extended and unconventional techniques; fascinating.

Sebastien Beliah is a Paris-based double bass player, a member of Umlaut Big Band, The Coquettes, Un poco loco, &c., here in a solo album of bass noir, dark and resonant tones evoked through strong bowing, finding harmonics between the strings and from the instrument itself, creating beautiful passages in a mirage of engulfing deep timbre.

Adventurous double bassist Pascal Niggenkemper was artist in residence at Wuppertal in the fall of 2017, presenting concerts with a diverse set of masterful improvisers from Europe and the US, excerpts of which are meticulously programmed in this 2-CD collection, organized by artistic endeavor and intent, from the spacious/introspective to wildly lively encounters; recommended.

Improvising guitarist/bassist, writer, and educator Joe Morris spent four months as visiting scholar at the University of Calgary, during which time he recorded with University of Calgary professor and double bassist Rob Oxoby, this freely improvised album with Morris on electric guitar, a great confluence of strings in 6 concentrated and adept dialogs.

Three "nonsensical" musical conversations between Malaysian experimental musician and Herbal International label founder Goh Lee Kwang, and Norwegian bass player and Nakama label leader Christian Meeas Svendsen; a first encounter between two different mindsets, nationalities and generations, packaged with a pencil to let you draw your own cover.

Using Edvard Munch's famous painting "The Scream" as his muse, German cellist living in Portugal, Ulrich Mitzlaff, presents 10 acoustic miniatures from just over a minute to 4 1/2 minutes in length, including wildly interactive moments of delirium to darkly melodic bowed passages, using his impressive technique to create vivid depictions of Munch's work.

Recorded at the Galeria Monumental during the Small Format Materials II Festival, Sul is a large string-oriented ensemble led by Ernesto Rodrigues that includes percussionist Andrew Drury and double bassist Hernani Faustino, alongside Creative Sources core players, orchestrated with viola, violin, cello, double bass, classical guitar, zither, percussion and objects.

Electric guitarist Olaf Rupp joins the father son/duo of violist Ernesto Rodrigues and cellist Guilherme cello, in studio recordings from Berlin in 2017, as three disparate strings intertwine in acoustics and electronics for an intensely evolving two part work, a textured tapestry of slow bowing, sustaining tones, unusual progressions, and odd percussive invention.

Adding a fourth string to the collaborations of Portugal's Lisbon String Trio of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Miguel Mira on cello, and Alvaro Rosso on contrabass, Portuguese violinist Carlos Zingaro adds an additional level of delicately complex interplay to the trio's exceptional free improvisation, as they pay tribute to the Greek goddess of light and extent.

A disc of extraordinary string works by Canadian composer Cassandra Miller, presenting four string quartets superbly played by the Quatuor Bozzini quartet of Clemens Merkel on violin, Alissa Cheung on violin, Stephanie Bozzini on viola, and Isabelle Bozzini on cello, including the large work "About Bach", awarded the Jules Leger Prize for New Chamber Music.

French-Japanese violist Frantz Loriot's first solo album takes the viola into unusual territory, using an acousmatic approach to create music and sounds with no visual reference by transforming the sound of the viola through preparations and remarkable extended techniques, layering and assembling his works to create concrete statements of movement.

Berlin-based violinist Biliana Voutchkova and German clarinetist Michael Thieke (Magic I.D., International Nothing) present a stunning achievement in blending compositional, pre-structured material with live improvisation, creating a blurring of virtually identical sections that create microtonal anomalies in timing, rhythm, timbre and motive, as heard in 3 amazing performances.

Jean-Marc Foussat recorded the French improvising duo of electric guitairst Marc Ducret and double bassist Joelle Leandre at 19PaulFort in May, 2018, the title drawn from a poem by Edgar Allen Poe, as the two trade acoustic and electric string approaches in a sophisticated dialog of exceptional technique and inventive approaches; superb.

Two performers related by Wandelweiser--guitarist Taku Sugimoto and cellist Stefan Thut--met at oslo10 in Switzerland to perform two concerts with one composition from each: Stefan Thut uses chance operations changing the music's direction at the prompt of rolled dice; Sugimoto use sustained notes and ebow in a subtle but effective sound work.

Performing on the Korean gayageum (also known as kayagum), Do Yeon Kim joins Joe Morris performing on guitar for five incredible string improvisations using a diversity of approaches from both players, including pointillistic improv, rich rivers of chords, languid moments of beauty, and moments where it's difficult to discern who is playing what.

Three strings, percussion and electronics from the quartet of Phillip Wachsmann on violin, electronics, Trevor Taylor on percussion, electronics, Marcio Mattos on bass, cello, electronics, and Ian Brighton on electric guitar, which grew out of the 2016 return of guitarist Ian Brighton and his String Thing, released on FMR as "Reunion: Live From Cafe Oto".

Improvised duos between Serbian violist Szilard Mezei and Hungarian cellist Albert Markos, for more than 15 years, with two previous albums recorded (Korom (Creative Sources, 2008), and "Der" (Bandcamp, 2016), this third album presents 5 interconnected works of subtle and impressive technique as the two string players trade approaches in a fascinating conversation.

French composer and guitarist Clara De Asis composed the extended soundwork "Without" for the duo of Erik Carlson (violin) and Greg Stuart (percussion), defining a precise framework for the position and duration of each sound section and silence, with outlines for texture, volume, use of tone or noise, and percussive materials, but leaving space for many of the performers' choices.

The Italian free improv quartet The Assassins (Francesco Cusa, drums; Giulio Stermieri, piano; Flavio Zanuttini, trumpet; Giovanni Benvenuti, sax) joins together with the classical chamber string ensemble, Florence Art Quartet (Daniele Iannaccone, violin; Lorenzo Borneo, violin; Agostino Mattioni, viola; Cristiano Sacchi, cello) in a wonderful hybrid of both approaches.

The Montreal string quartet Quatuor Bozzini of Alissa Cheung on violin, Clemens Merkel on violin, Stephanie Bozzini on viola, and Isabelle Bozzini on cello is extended with double bassist Pierre-Alexandre Maranda as they perform composer Simon Martin's work of long tones and timbres, exploring the nature and philosophy of sound, and our relationship to it.

Berlin double bassist Mathias Bauer, a member of Unitedberlin, Asian Art, Junge Music and mosaik, and half of the duo Alchimia Organica, presents a series of 18 solid and diverse spontaneous improvisations, most averaging under 3 minutes, captivating the listener through articulate momentum, exceptional technique, and inventive narrative.

German violinist & composer Dietrich Petzold joins violist Ernesto Rodrigues and cellist Guilherme Rodrigues, Petzold also bringing along a viola, clavichord and bowed metal objects, as the three perform live at SKUC Gallery, in Ljubljana, Slovenia for the 6 improvisations that build from languid tonal environments to detailed, rapid improv, all with remarkable control and patience.

Recording in Germany, Creative Source's two Rodrigues'--Ernesto on viola and Guilherme on cello--along with double bassist Klaus Kurvers, celebrate legendary improvising cellist Tristan Honsinger's birthday in this studio album of active playing with a chamber quartet feeling through superb technical skills yielding electrifying string improvisation.