Harmos

Album review

Harmos is a work dating from 1989 and recorded just before the LJCO turned 20. Guy's composition is based on a series of elongated tones that create the basis for both collective and group improvisation inside a series of marked spaces and intervals. The notational devices are usually carried by the brass section that includes trombonists Paul Rutherford, Radu Malfatti, Alan Thomlinson, trumpeter Jon Corbett, and others. The reeds, which are in the capable hands of Evan Parker, Trevor Watts, Paul Dunmall, Simon Picard, and Peter McPhail, signify the color and pitch changes throughout the work. The collisions happen in the sections where group improvisation is central to further the next section of the piece along and these interactions take place more as weaves of sound tapestries than actual confrontations. When both Barre Phillips and Guy bow their basses with violinist Phil Wachsmann against the saxophone section as the brass tries to insert a marked intervallic shift, things really get interesting. The most beautiful thing about Guy is that as a composer he is not hung up on resolution, he's more concerned with the notion that everything in the palette be viewed, everything that's in the box should be rolled out and put on display. If a particular series of ideas do resolve themselves timbrally or in modal invention that's fine, but it's not necessarily the end intent. This is a 44-minute work of deft imagination, powerful technique, and wild interplay; fans of the LJCO or those whose tastes encompass vanguard big bands should not miss it.

© Thom Jurek /TiVo