After performing together in Canada beginning in 2019, bass clarinetist & electronic artist Philippe Lauzier and NY percussionist Carl Costa remained in contact during the pandemic by exchanging compositional concepts, the 4-part "Sincronica Vaga" and "Soft Routine" the results, the former based on dovetailing motives, the latter on harmonic counterpoint interaction.

Having originally met in 2016 when Viennese trumpeter Franz Hautzinger and Quebec electric bassist Éric Normand formed Torche! with Michel F Cote, Philippe Lauzier and Xavier Charles, the two improvisers developed this collage during the pandemic from asynchronous recordings, creating six dramatic and explorative compositions of incredible and unusual technique.

Trumpet City is a 60 minute live-installation of 40 or more trumpets performing outdoors in a public space, first commissioned and presented by the Prasidialdepartement and the Musikpodium of the City of Zurich, these two realization are from recordings at 51st Street, in Manhattan, New York and at Meeker Avenue between Lorimer and Leonard Streets, in Brooklyn, New York.

Focused on the unusual physical properties of their instruments as tubes and air chambers capable of remarkable palette of sounds, overtones, thumps and inexplicable manifestations, Berlin-based trumpeter Brad Henkel and recorder player Miako Klein present two extended conversation of intensely compatible and wildly controlled, extended approaches to improvisation.

Written by Catalan composer Ferran Fages for pianist Lluïsa Espigolé following a quote by Catalan author Carles Camps Mundó — "Barely anything: deformities of silence" — this delicate work of resonance, space and suspense slowly unfolds, the score giving Espigolé choices for timing and placement as each meaningful note or combination subsides.

Creating complex intervals that the players must "notice among each other" as a model for coexistence, cellist Stefan Thut's score for three string players and sine waves, here configured for double bass (Félicie Bazelaire), acoustic guitar (Fredrik Rasten) and cello (Thut) with Léo Dupleix on sine waves tuned to multiples of prime numbers and attached to the wooden boxes that serve as transducers.

Dedicated to Cor Fuhler, Tasmanian guitarist Nick Ashwood's extended composition is a thoughtfully introspective work of rich sonority, shifting harmonics and abstract tones generated through guitar bowing, recorded live to tape in two continuous recordings, the second overlaying the first as the work unfolds in a meditative and beautifully pensive manner.

Featuring cellists Nina Hitz and Lucija Gregov, double bassist Goncalo Almeida and Rutger Zuydervelt (Machinefabriek) on electronics, recording in Old Church, in Rotterdam Charlois for six pensive improvisations, a collective conversation of concurrently layered, minimalist melodic and textural lines expanded with drones, evoking the mythical Greek multi-headed monster.

Slippery confluence to taut string friction in the duo of Argentinian cellist & improviser Violeta Garcia and Quebec cellist Emilie Girard-Charest, both bringing impressive improvisational resumes and classical grounding to their uniquely informed dialogs, heard in a five part album exploring a remarkable range of technical skill and expression.

Canadian saxophonist Yves Charuest and London-based violist Benedict Taylor found common ground in their first meetings in London in 2017, improvising together and performing at Mopomoso, Charuest then inviting Taylor to Montreal in the winter of 2019 for duo performances, leading to this excellent album of confidently fragile interaction and agile attention.

Using electric & acoustic guitars and autoharp over spacious electronics and field recordings, Belgium musician & video artist Jean De Lacoste and Rotterdamn sound artist Rutger Zuydervelt, aka Machinefabriek, create broad pallets of ringing sounds over which acoustic instruments intone, with cellist Fransesco Guerri joining on one of 8 gently unfolding "Scramblings".

Recorded live at Silence Sounds in Guelph Canada, the duo of Xavier Charles on clarinet and Eric Normand on electric bass & objects eschew idiom in favor of their unique natural language on their instruments, applying patient development of truly idiosyncratic and fascinating command through a single extended work punctuated in seven diverse passages.