Mary Rapp / Noam Yaffe / Lizzy Welsh / Biddy Connor / Elena Kats-Cherin / Freya Schack-Arnott / Jim Denley / Robbie Avenaim / Clayton Thomas / Julia Reidy / Judith Hamann / Cor Fuhler / Zubin Kanga / Chloe Sobek / Erkki Veltheim / Jon Rose / Rachael Kim / Hollis Taylor / Michael McNab / Maria Moles / Claire Edwards

Australian violinist Jon Rose may live on what’s perhaps the biggest island in the world. But he actually inhabits a space that’s much bigger and smaller than the country-continent. With connections throughout the world, Rose’s music has never been limited to one area. At the same time his idiosyncratic playing, unique compositions and constant inventions and use of many string-driven instruments also make him a singular resident of his own cordoned off homeland, perhaps called Roseland. This singularity doesn’t preclude collaboration and this descriptive two-CD set offers more than 2½ hours of his work as improviser, composer and conceptualizer plus an informative booklet lavishly illustrated with photos of many invented string instruments.

More straightforward in a way, CD1’s 19 tracks are subdivided into a series of duets with long-time Aussie associates, alto saxophonist Jim Denley, bassist Clayton Thomas, percussionist Robbie Avenaim and Freya Schack-Arnott playing nyckelharpa, a traditional Swedish fiddle with strings and keys. Even though Rose trots out some of his odd resonating string inventions such as Thai pumpkin soup violin; the EL Lubricto with the resonator attached to an oil drum; and the keyolin that combines a piano keyboard and a two-string violin; only with Avenaim do the results sound a little more oddball than what’s played in so-called conventional improvisations. In fact with nyckelharpa strokes taking on dulcimer-like tones and static vibrations and Rose’s spiccato and col legno fiddle extensions cracked and crinkled you could be hearing an outlier Outback hoedown when he plays with her. More folksy than frantic, radicalism is only noticeable in string tone criss-crossing and when squirming away from obvious melody. Denley’s accelerating split tones and pointed tonguing logically brush up against Rose’s pizzicato strums, arco thrusts and tone fragmenting. On the extended “As It Is” the slippery exposition is emphasized with stopped strings and irregular buzzes. It climaxes with Denley blowing thinning air currents through the alto’s body tube completed by Rose’s squeaky string pulls.

Super staccato thunks and squeaks mark the Thomas-Rose duet as they shake and slash along their respective string sets. Stabbing and screeching, the highly elevated pitches don’t mask that even at this velocity between them both manage to dig out all the partials and extensions of many notes and additional tones. Slower tracks like “Turnings” and “And Then Some” are distinguished by extended drones echoing from Thomas’ low-pitched strings and linked to Rose’s hurdy-gurdy-like buzzing. “Turnings” is completed by a concentrated drone, while the other track varies the interaction with willowy string pulls and resonating slaps against solid surfaces, climaxing with descriptive banjo-like strums from the bassist. Because of Covid19 restrictions the four Avenaim tracks were created via computer file exchange which each player adding and blending his parts from separate locations. Despite that the improvisations betray no distance fissure. Old hand at processing mechanical and machine-like timbres, the percussionist’s rapid pummeling and buzzing vibrations create their own rhythmic space, with intersectional string plucks and arco stretches among the expositions. Distinct violin tones are really only defined on “Fluck”, yet the slicing prestissimo lines at high and low pitches are matched by loops of mechanized slaps and beanbag-like rustles and pops. There are more sonic impersonations on “Sebastien and Co” with Rose’s pizzicato strums intersecting with Avenaim’s rumbles, pop and stretches at times resembling a balloon being stretched or a mechanized rooster crowing.

Made up of Rose initiated projects and experiments from earlier in the century; CD2 is less of a hodgepodge and more of an indication of his versatility. Most distinguished are “Elastic Band”, recorded in 2015 with the Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna conducted by Ilan Volkov, jointly composed by Elena Kats-Cherin; and the 2016 and 2019 variations on “Music in a Time of Dysfunction” alongside subsets of Aussie players. Fitting an improvised violin solo within the strictures of a traditional orchestral work is Rose’s challenge in Bologna. To be heard among the tutti, processional, ascending and descending passages from the orchestra, there are times at which he could be Isaac Stern playing however his sul tasto runs and spiccato pacing create a singular impression. By the final section his strained squeaks and kinetic runs appear to encourage the orchestral sections to loosen up with harsh brass blasts, percussive piano runs making its part almost overwrought.

In 2016 “Music in a Time of Dysfunction” was treated contrapuntally. Frails and twangs echoing from Julia Reidy’s guitar and Cor Fuhler’s keyolin, underlined by pulsations from Zubin Kanga’s distressed organ operate alongside the sometime conventionally horizontal and sometimes harsh rubbing of the five live and processed strings. A crescendo at mid-point resolves the divide in that the torqued strings continue bowing as the electrified products replicate timbres resembling a sidewalk drill and an electric shaver. Swelling drones climax with a group downward slide to a warmer, paced finale. By 2019 “Music in a Time of Dysfunction” has an almost baroque introduction from the six string players challenged by Web inference by Avenaim, Rose, Michael McNab and Maria Moles. The solid exposition is broken in the middle when the three fiddlers pick up scordatura-tuned cheap violins scratching swells, plucks, stops and picks at varied speeds and pitches. A proper finale is signaled when the ensemble slows down the narrative for connected vibrations.

Of geographical interest, State of Play offers the most varied aural sightseeing for those sound explorers who wish to travel to the separate province founded, organized and populated by Jon Rose.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing: CD1: 1. Carpets 2. Lawson’s Loss 3. As It Is 4. Asian Centuries 5. The Clattering.6. Whistle While You Wonder 7. The Spring in Wood 8. Quartertone Requiem 9. Forecast of Fire 10. Northlandia 11. The Large Pocket^ 12. Turnings^ 13. And Then Some^ 14. Valley Heights 15. Finger Twisters 16. Rumble in the Jungle 17. Sebastien and Co 18. Fluck 19. Wheel Game^ CD2: 1. Music in a Time of Dysfunction# 2. Singing Up the Harbour Bridge% 3. Elastic Band& 4. Duelling Banjos and Banjo Duality~ 5. Hills Hoist Music 6. The Gamble 7. Music in a Time of Dysfunction#

Personnel: Jim Denley (alto saxophone [1:1-4]; Jon Rose (tenor violin, keyolin [1:5-10], ^,violin, banjo~); Erkki Veltheim, Elizabeth Welsh, Rachael Kim, Noam Yaffe# (violin); Biddy Connor, Hollis Taylor (viola); Judith Hamann, Mary Rapp (cello); Chloe Sobek (violone); Freya Schack-Arnott (nyckelharpa ([1:5-10]); Cor Fuhler (keyolin)#; Julia Reidy# (guitar); Clayton Thomas (bass ([1:11-15); Robbie Avenaim (percussion ([1:16-19], automatic strings); Michael McNab, Maria Moles (Web interference); Zubin Kanga (distressed organ); Claire Edwards# (fence); The Song Company%, Anthony Pitts (conductor); Susannah Lawergren, Anna Fraser (soprano); Hannah Fraser (alto); Richard Black (tenor); Mark Donnelly (baritone); Andrew O’Connor (bass); Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Ilan Volkov (conductor); Elena Kats-Cherin (co-composer w. JR)&