Harmony and Abyss

When pianist and composer embraced keyboards and sampling, he made the decision to follow the path the music cut for him, even if it led away from . The result of this journey has been richly and rewardingly detailed on his own albums for in the series and those of his collaborators. On , moves even further afield into repetitive melodic and harmonic structures that have more in common with vanguard song forms than they do or . None of the pieces here is over six and a half minutes and the majority of them are in the four-minute range. Here, melodic and rhythmic ideas are stated as harmonic and chromatic concepts, endlessly repeated and mutated until they change shape and focal points. The result is fascinating and compelling, but there is no longer any resemblance to . If anything, these pieces feel more like vanguard pieces viewed through an prism, even if the piano is their starting point. Bassist , drummer , and sampling slice-and-dice whiz follow 's lead, taking him through twists and turns that end in increasingly strange and often beautiful places. This is a challenging record, one that does not easily or readily give up its secrets. But its rewards more than make up for the effort. is going his own way here into the rabbit hole; listeners would be well advised to track him because where he's going, no one has gone before. ~ Thom Jurek