KaneLoggiaHYPOTHESIS

Strinning & Daisy
Castle and Sun
veto-exchange 020

Udo Schindler & Eric Zwang Eriksson
Blow & Swirl
FMR CD 635-0822

Per Gärdin/Vasco Trilla
Singularity
Creatives Sources CS 705 CD

Working on the assumption that blowing into a hollow tube and banging on a hard surface were humans first instruments, musicians who collaborate in a reed/percussion duo are stripping their interaction down to its essence. Of course modern instruments, techniques and recoding make sure that the programs are anything but primitive.

The most spartan session here is Castle and Sun, five instant compositions by Lucerne-based tenor saxophonist Sebastian Strinning and Chicago drummer Tim Daisy. Strinning, who has worked with the likes of Sylvie Courvoisier and Marc Unternährer, and Daisy, who has played with numerous creative players in Europe and the US, connect from the start and maintain creativity throughout. Beginning with a gentle drum clip and a flutter tongued sax squeak, the improvisations soon advances to harsh superfast reed snarls and tongue stops intersecting with authoritative rim shots and cymbal claps , allowing for melodic interludes and brief solo spots for both players. With a short introduction and slightly longer conclusion that finally steadies Strinning’s near-unstoppable sheets of sound into slower and emphasized puffs, the most spectacular intersection evolves during the sonic illustration brought forth during the extended “Picture”. The saxophonist’s decorated brush strokes include burbling smears, shaking Bronx cheer-like sibilants, plus repeated split tones that ricochet from renal growls to altissimo doits. As Strinning’s reed textures thicken with notes upon notes piled on top of one another, the linear thread is still preserved by Daisy’s drum rumbles and pops, with the entire performance finally rebounding and downshifting to a more horizontal narrative.

Frenetic enough to make some of the other duos sound as if they’re playing romantic ballads, KaneLoggiaHYPOTHESIS’ Ventilation starts off amplified above one to 10 to 11 and steadily accelerates from there. The unwieldy band name is actually a mélange of two players  – flutist/tenor saxophonist Bonnie Kane and percussionist John Loggia  – who on their three-selection use processing and electronics to pile futuristic textures on top of primordial ones. Loggia is a Vermont arts curator, while Kane has recorded with people as varied as Jon Spencer and Adam Lane. Near-silent reed puffs and hollow percussion slaps at the top quickly give way to a constant barrage of smashing and clattering Mylar, wood, metal and bell resonations on one side and extended slurs, smears, split tones and shills from the other. The wallowing excess and banshee-like shrieks from both of Kane’s instruments are further mutilated and reconstituted with wave form pulses as processed reed timbres are mixed among the live improvisations, though seemingly at a different speed. Loggia’s percussion patterns, which encompass gong resonations, metallic raps and wooden and bongo-like pressure, never follow a standard beat and are likewise diffused with voltage crackles and vibrations. While the duo stops playing rather than concludes, the outpouring of further tones that include bagpipe-chanter -like buzzes and drum smashes and rumbles that precedes the ending has defined the duo’s exclusive niche.

Choice in adopting the muted, messy and multiphonic currents of free music, the German duo on Blow & Swirl do exactly as the title says on one nearly 53-minute improvisation and a brief encore. Upping the instrumental ante Eric Zwang Eriksson, who also fashions audio-visual installations, adds a variety of percussion to his drum set, while Udo Schindler, who works with numerous international creative musicians, plays sopranino and tenor saxophones and tubax. Beginning with hollow pops and sallow squeaks that almost squeeze to silence,  within a few minutes the two reach a primary climax of boisterous percussion smacks and drags and keening , circular-breathed reed screams. Soon though the duo varies its output as it moves  from obstreperous to moderation. That means the two alternate between whistling and hissing swallowed mid-range notes and mouthpiece osculation to projecting unbreakable horizontal note flow from his lower-pitched horns on Schindler’s part to Eriksson’s equivalents that range from strident drum top buzzes and cymbal shakes to delicately brushed rolls and crackles on wood and metal. Thickened with concentrated chalumeau register pressure from the tubax at mid-point drum pitter patter lightens the mood until it settles into a mid-range exposition. At the same time as vocalized reed smears descend to mid-range split tones, understated flutter tonguing and dyspeptic smears, the duo’s broken-chard evolution means that the drummer’s measured clip-clop help hold on to horizontal evolution and finally a mid-range conclusion despite those interludes where the saxophonist’s shrieks, growls and tongue slaps threaten to upend the timbral combinations.

A variation of Blow & Swirl, facilitated by file exchange from September 2020  to March 2021 during the Covid lockdown is Singularity with Swedish saxophonist Per Gärdin, who has played with the Red trio among others, and Catalonian percussionist Vasco Trilla, who has recorded with Yedo Gibson to pick one. In this case while Gärdin sticks to alto and soprano saxophones, Trilla switches among a percussion section of  timpani, gongs, clock chimes, metronomes and drums. What that means on most tracks is when the saxophonist produces circular breathed tone spattering, unbroken shrilling tones, sudden doits or multiphonic squeals, the percussionist responds with buzzing metallic tones, chime clanks, metronome drones or gong pealing. Similar techniques arise in the opposite direction. The split-second coordination also takes place with responsive linear motion, as demonstrated by “Dynamis”, a meld of delicate soprano sax trills and airy reverb from hanging bells and clock chiming. Pared down to drum kit and tenor saxophone, the prestissimo reed and kit pounding can replicate what Strinning and Daisy attained during their duets. However despite the distances, Gärdin and Trilla are most interactive on extended pieces like the title track and “Entekhnos” when the textures from  multiple sound sources can be used. On the first idiophone patterns spread amoeba-like around and beside the ragged reed whistles and peeps that ascend to altissimo with, tone swallows and circular breathing to evolve in tandem with nerve beats, cymbal recoil and droning metronome ticking, finally reach an octave blend. Gong and chime reverb are most prominent on “Entekhnos”. Yet in spite of louder bell-like pulsations, bite-sized tenor saxophone tongue flutters spiral in broken-octave connection with percussion.

Blowing and banging instrumental tones together in duo form have obviously changed greatly over the eons. Yet the crucial take away from the creative sounds here is that each duo is able to apply invention and technical facility to sets that evolve with the same freedom of expression that was initially discovered.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Ventilation: 1. Introduction to Breathing 2. Dreams and Splinters 3. Crossing the Blood Brain Barrier

Personnel: Ventilation: Bonnie Kane (flute, tenor saxophone and electronics) and John Loggia (percussion and sonotronics)

Track Listing: Castle: 1. Turning Over 2. Frequency A 3. Picture 4. Frequency B 5. Afternoons

Personnel: Castle: Sebastian Strinning (tenor saxophone) and Tim Daisy (drums and objects)

Track Listing: Blow: 1. Blow & Swirl #1 2. Blow & Swirl #2/encore

Personnel: Blow: Udo Schindler (sopranino and tenor saxophones and tubax) and Eric Zwang Eriksson (drums and percussion)

Track Listing: Singularity: 1. Enthymeme I 2. Apodeixis 3. Pistis I 4. Singularity 5. Dynamis 6. Antistrophos7. Entekhnos 8. Pistis II 9. Enthymeme II

Personnel: Singularity: Per Gärdin (alto and soprano saxophones) and Vasco Trilla (timpani, gongs, clock chimes, metronomes and drums)