"Embedded in the conservative Midwest like antibodies are composers surviving on grants and teaching, quiet subversives whose subtle manipulations of craft deny them the hype lavished on more fashionable experimenters.

For composer Morgan Powell, Common Root should finally be the disc that puts him and his collaborators in the front rank of musicians who find drama in that tricky zone where free improv and scored classical traditions meet. Unlike many musicians who blast noisy dissonance in broad strokes Powell uses noise in almost discreet ebbs and flows, supporting and commenting on the singspiel of Phoebe Legere, who glides through tricky changes with the comedic assurance of a master sax player. Her vocalizations search for ever newer valleys and peaks in Powell's music, and her lyrics use Beat and saga forms, laced with vaudeville humor, to repair the rift between hard science and art.

There's brittle flash and then there is substance. Powell, Legere and supporting artists the Tone Road Ramblers have for too long suffered because the network of press and industry who can't tell the difference."