"Earlier this year Ernesto Rodrigues released 'Pataphysique (with Guilherme Rodrigues and Carlos Zingaro), as noted here last month, as well as a somewhat similar string trio with violinist Gerhard Uebele (Solitude, recorded back in 2022...). Both seem to set a "silence" orientation aside, i.e. as assertive albums with plenty of recorded presence, boisterous even in their activity levels (and sometimes also "classical" or Romantic, in their inspirations...). And a more aggressive orientation does seem to maintain for Rodrigues' most recent releases too, i.e. quartet Untitled Dream (recorded in December) as well as (perhaps paradoxically, pace the title...) trio Ethereal Sighs (recorded in November).

The former seems more basically exploratory, often in assertive tones, including from electronics (and with frequent collaborators in general), focusing on reduced timbral combos and sometimes stark (perhaps even piercing...) textures across different tracks. It can seem almost like a restart, a new experiment.

The latter involves a new ensemble though, yet not completely new, with Rodrigues (including on crackle box, its strange, especially high tones becoming increasingly prominent...) joined by vocalist Maria Radich and violinist Maria do Mar: I'd actually done a little survey for the review of L'age de l'oreille (in May 2023), noting that despite producing many improvised vocal albums, Rodrigues had appeared with few vocalists himself to that point, but a vocalist noted there was already Radich (for the first time in this space), i.e. for appearing in some of his larger groups....

And then do Mar had been mentioned too, for being in the larger String Theory ensemble (and specifically Heptaphonies, reviewed July 2017), but also appeared with Rodrigues for a series of smaller ensemble albums (all from 2020, it seems). The situation presents a little less familiarity then, but not new relations, and of course L'age de l'oreille presents a ready comparison (from the Rodrigues discography), substituting here violin for cello (and a different vocalist).

Ethereal Sighs thus arrives in this space, in some sense, with a similar (relative) situation as Blonk, Smith and Zerang from last month, i.e. recalling a prominent previous vocal album (also from 2023), happening to present as well with a little less textural density, including via more open senses of overlapping calls.

With cello, the earlier trio (with Ute Wassermann, also pairing strings) had presented a larger pitch gamut then, indeed suggesting senses of depth (and there's a sense of anticipation and gravity from the start...), whereas the overlapping ranges of Ethereal Sighs can dictate more a taking turns (e.g. with counterpoint more embedded within the viola part itself than moving across the trio...).

And then there's a strong recorded presence as well, although not necessarily from voice, which tends to hide in the texture, perhaps via skittering whispers or other inarticulate offerings, but also e.g. into muffled screams - animating the short album (recorded live in Lisbon), beginning and ending with audible applause around what can become some rather taut interactive moments.

The string duo thus dominates the texture at times (anticipating the voice...), with the violin often projecting senses of (quasi-Cageian...) extension in held tones, again coming to close interactions. (The crackle box comes to sound like e.g. rubbing a balloon? There're some very high pitch combos between the two at times.)

Voice might thus become the lowest sounding instrument, with this sort of close-range alto-soprano trio suggesting e.g. Spleen from Rodrigues' recent output (also with Zingaro, plus Carlos Bechegas on flutes, noted here November 2024...). The smaller overall range can suggest feelings of (spatial) specificity and intimacy, i.e. yields a sense of occasion and even secrecy.

And then the title seems almost calculated to troll me personally, pace medieval reviews here, where these have been terms I've used pejoratively for many years! In that case, projecting one's own tentative appraisal and sense of distance back onto surviving music might be inevitable in some ways, but as a performance goal? The historical music was not inarticulate mush, of that we can be confident...!

Yet such a weak approach was explicitly hailed by ("early music") critics, and with regularity.... Anyway, here we don't have historical music (or it's instantly historical...), and so interrogating notions of communication, humanity and presence becomes an active means of (contemporary, artistic...) engagement.

(This sort of thing is sometimes done with thoughtful intent in medieval presentations too, but as a default it's been lazy, reflecting as well prejudice and laziness from even critical listeners.)

The result becomes performative, including pace the frequently more assertive quality of Ethereal Sighs. Much consequently seems to happen over the course of its twenty-seven minutes - leaving a stronger impression upon repeated exposure."-Todd McComb's Jazz Thoughts