Featuring two extraordinary works: Playing Guitar is for electric guitar, sampler, live electronics and large chamber ensemble and Frame 1-Resonance is for electric guitar, electronics and piano. Symphony 1 is actually about “playing guitar” or sampled guitar with the fifteen piece large chamber group utilized here. This is Tim Brady’s 10th CD in print and this just might be his best yet. His symphonic writing is particularly strong, varied and adventurous. What makes this so special is the way his guitar fits perfectly as a part of the ensemble and as a soloist in the center of the action or story. The other thing that works so well here is the way Tim has programmed his sampler and filled it with a variety of strange guitar sounds, which often don’t sound like a guitar, but are used selectively to add sonic spices to his fascinating creation. Fripp fans will certainly be smiling as they listen to the Second Movement with its Frippish guitar solo. This is an absolutely fantastic work that I would hope would be perfect for next year’s Victo Fest. Frame 1-Resonance for piano, guitar and electronics is a more restrained and eerie work, in which the piano is echoed by sinister guitar sounds and weird samples.

It seems that French contrabassists supreme, Joëlle Léandre, loves the duo situation and consistently finds players worldwide worthy of her collaborations. Up at the Guelph Jazz Fest a couple of weeks ago, she played a marvelous duo set with violinist India Cooke. Joëlle seeks out great partners, both well-known and little known. Check out this short list: Rüdiger Carl, Irène Schweizer, Mark Nauseef, Carlos Zingaro, Giorgio Occhipinti, Tetsu Saitoh and François Houle. Can’t say that I’ve heard of Gianni Lenoci before, but he does have three trio CDs out on Splasch and is a member of the Eugenio Colombo Quartet. Besides modern jazz, Gianni performs the music of modern composers like Morton Feldman and John Cage. The title of this CD means “certain to swing” [sic], but I believe they this is meant in jest. This CD consists of 14 shorter pieces. Each piece shows the different styles, approaches and sonic palette that both of these players draw from. Plucking, bowing, rubbing and banging on her bass strings as Gianni also plays inside the piano with assorted objects as well as a variety of cautious, quietly intense and occasionally dreamy sounds on the piano keyboard. Although this is the first time that Joëlle and Gianni had worked together, it is certainly hard to tell, since they work so well together. Another wonderful collaboration from the consistently great Joëlle Léandre.

Tout ne serait que boucles évolutives, semble suggérer l’artiste sonore Pierre-André Arcand. C’est pour mieux exploiter cette perspective qu’il a construit la Macchina Ricordi, petit logiciel offert à qui le veut sur le Web et qui permet de faire vivre ses propres boucles à partir de sons divers. Non seulement Arcand a-t-il rassemblé une série d’expérimentations parentes dans cet Atlas, mais on retrouve sur le second disque une exploration visuelle à partir de ces sons et procédés récursifs. Les amateurs de manipulation bruitiste trouveront là un radicalisme digne de Nurse With Wound ou de Mount Vernon Astral Temple, de même que cette faculté de faire vivre les éructations de machines.

Contrebassiste d’exception, Joëlle Léandre opte pour une approche excessivement corporelle, grâce à laquelle on croirait parfois s’intégrer aux nerfs et aux os de l’instrumentiste. Dans une démarche rigoureuse et surprenante où elle sollicite aussi la double basse et le bruitisme vocal, les cordes subissent le pincement, le frottement et la percussion sans aucune trace d’exercice de style. Ici rejointe par le pianiste italien Gianni Lenoci, la Française (Aix) s’engage dans un de ces dialogues qui ont fait le bien-fondé de sa quarantaine de disques (aux côtés des Zorn, Frith, Braxton, Lacy, entre autres). Un moment fort pour cette artiste intégrale.

Cet album est le fruit d’une invitation du pianiste Gianni Lenoci lancée à la grande contrebassiste Joëlle Léandre. Une première rencontre entre les deux musiciens qui laisse l’auditeur pantois devant une telle osmose. À l’écoute, on croirait qu’une seule personne joue simultanément de deux instruments. Léandre et Lenoci ont su faire fi de leur virtuosité respective afin de mettre l’accent sur la qualité de l’ensemble. Leur jeu respectif est musical et plein de retenue. Ils évitent par le fait même les écueils de l’aridité et de la facilité. Le résultat est probant, nos oreilles se laissent bercer au gré des 14 improvisations en duo. Les amateurs de musiques improvisées seront étourdies par tant de beauté. 9,5

If you’re an adventurous listener who’s curious about the seemingly endless parade of avant-garde jazz and improv music streaming in all directions from Montréal’s Ambiances Magnétiques label, this supergroup sampler is a fine place to find your bearings. The Ensemble is a large and loose collective whose “members” include people like Jean Derome, Martin Tétreault, Joane Hétu and Sam Shalabi. This CD is… kind of confusing, so I’ll let the liner notes explain — Canevas «+» “is a collage made from 14 sound excerpts taken from five different concerts by Ensemble SuperMusique presented between 1998 and 2004”. Each concert had a specific theme. One from October of 2000, for example, was an homage to folk singer/songwriter Mary Travers, known as “La Bolduc”. As that explanation implies, this is a shaky, inconsistent album that’s hard to swallow whole, but it covers such a wide spectrum of experimental improv that it should have something for everyone.

There’s a lot of potential action and many sparse stretches here. La tulipe is the sound of random (but probably not random) whistles and thwacks created with various implements, tools and appliances. Impro2 sneaks Diane Labrosse’s truly terrifying sampler bursts and other squeals into your drink, while Kristin Molnar’s banshee violin lends a fever dream quality to Le caillou, le cristal et le camion’s batshit-crazy crescendo. Trio sounds like Cecil Taylor on speedballs trading dreamed-up licks with a toy horn-wielding Don Cherry. On a more boring note, Impro 1 is over five minutes of bullshit wank revolving around simulated birdcalls. So even if it’s a mixed bag as an album, Canevas «+» will at least point you to the outer limits players and composers you’ll want to study further.