Rova 2006 Donor CD

The first two tracks on the CD come from a concert at the Trinity Chapel of Berkeley from last December. On a chilly evening we had a good time in its acoustic warmth, which shows up in the lovely sound of this recording.

The title of “Anomalous Ejecta” comes from a map of Mars. This piece is a recent graphic score by Steve Adams that uses the concept in a more concrete way than previous graphic scores of his. This is followed by “Juke Box Afro Balkan,” the latest in Jon Raskin’s “Juke Box” series. In this piece the quartet improvises off a set of interlocking lines.

The next two tracks come from an Orkestrova concert that was part of our most recent European tour. We did several different collaborations on this tour, including three versions of Orkestrova. All three featured Natsuki Tamura on trumpet, Akira Horikoshi on drums and Satoko Fujii on piano playing compositions by Satoko Fujii, Natsuki Tamura and Steve Adams. This recording comes from Lausanne, Switzerland, where we were joined by Yannik Barman on trumpet, John Aram and Yves Massy on trombone and Popol Lavanchy on bass. The first piece “Aaaaaahhh Dah Dah Dah” is by Natsuki Tamura, and is a loose sketch that gets the players to express themselves in a direct and remarkable way. This is followed by Steve Adams’ “Survival (in five acts),” which gets a particularly focused performance here.

The last two pieces come from a 2004 concert Rova did at the Chicago Cultural Center, which is in an amazing 19th century building that originally was the main Public Library. The concert was held in a large domed room that featured lovely mosaics and another beautiful acoustic space. John Zorn’s “Lakom” was arranged by Larry Ochs and has a spirited interchange directed by hand signals. Last is Steve Adams’ “Parallel Construction #1” where the players use a long melodic line and a chordal trio to create the performance.

We hope you enjoy these recordings from our recent performances, and we sincerely thank you for your support, which helps make them possible. We hope to see you at a concert in the coming year.

Bruce Ackley, Steve Adams, Jon Raskin and Larry Ochs