Awase

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In 2016, after a decade-long silence, pianist and composer Nik Bärtsch resurrected his groundbreaking Mobile unit for Continuum. Awase sees the musician reconvening Ronin -- the band that drew the attention of ECM's Manfred Eicher and released four stellar albums between 2006 and 2012 -- after a six-year break. The lineup has been trimmed from a quintet to a quartet, consisting of veterans Sha on bass clarinet and alto saxophone, drummer Kaspar Rast, and newcomer Thomi Jordy on electric bass. Continuing to compose in his modular system where interlocking rhythms meet contrapuntal, minimal grooves that Bärtsch defines as "Zen funk," he delivers new works as well as expanded and revisioned takes on earlier pieces as a way of extending the band's reach to embrace and integrate some of the concepts offered on Continuum. While each group's identity remains distinct, the aesthetic premise is holistic.
The two bookend pieces on Awase, opener "Modul 60" and closer "Modul 59," follow the established minimalist M.O. in layering elementary harmonic notions placed in service to group interplay. In the case of the latter, Bärtsch's love of atmospheric ostinatos articulated as grooves holds primary sway, with the three other musicians underscoring them with fragmentary, repetitive figures. "Modul 36" creates an even more fragmentary sense with piano arpeggios -- with feints at pointillism -- and the first journey in unison ("awase" is a martial arts term that means "moving together") with Jordy's bassline, until he departs rhythmically and drops a limber yet forceful, angular funk. "Modul 34" opens wide to embrace rubbery funk after a near-pastoral opening piano statement; Rast's drumming is crisp and precise even in his more extroverted and creative breakbeats. There is a first on this date, as well: Sha contributes the composition "A," marking the first occasion that a non-Bärtsch tune has made it onto one of his recordings. It stands apart, offering a clean series of bass and piano ostinatos in waltz time. Bärtsch interpolates jagged pulses that nod at early German techno. At 18 minutes, "Modul 58" feels like an encapsulation of the ideas offered here stretched to the point of fracture, meeting concepts heretofore articulated on earlier Ronin recordings. It is both a summation and a future manifesto. Its slowly constructed layers of piano are adorned with intermittent bass harmonics and cymbal washes, as well as lovely, melodic saxophone lines. Bärtsch employs his instrument's upper register to deliver rhythmic statements that contrast the minimalist precision of Detroit techno and the drama of post-rock. Following this, the band gets beat conscious and nearly danceable, though Sha's saxophone tricks -- tongue-slapping to single-note blasts to breathing air through the bell -- create a subsequent contrapuntal melody answered by piano.
Awase reveals Bärtsch's aesthetic methodology as instantly recognizable to anyone who has heard it before. That said, he's also expanded its color, texture, and timbral palettes, bringing a more strident physicality into Ronin's skeletal music and extrapolating it in more readily accessible harmonic compositions -- without sacrificing the layers of mystery in its heart.

© Thom Jurek /TiVo