Colorwheel presents sixteen. mostly contemplative and introspective free improvised duets of American, Sacramento-based pianist Alan Ernst, who plays in local bands, and his friend, alto sax player Jon Raskin, a member of the legendary ROVA Saxophone Quartet for the last 42 years.
This first collaboration happened after Ernst recorded solo piano pieces at The Bunker Recording Studio in Sacramento. The recording engineer, Spencer Temby, asked Raskin to add his alto sax on one of Ernst’s pieces. Both Ernst and Raskin liked the result. Ernst and Raskin collaborated in 2020in a benefit concert for the Sacramento Children’s Home.
The debut album of Ernst and Raskin was recorded at the same studio in November 2024, with Temby as the recording engineer. Ernst and Raskin established an immediate affinity and an emphatic interplay, and they let the music lead them, flow and develop in its own accord, effortlessly and unhurriedly, and explore a myriad of sound colors, but with a strong sensibility of form and structure.. These pieces flirt with jazz and free jazz, and contemporary music, but refuse to surrender to genre or style rules. As the recording session progressed, Ernst and Raskin experimented more with playful, abstract, and expressionist textures, as well as with extended breathing and percussive techniques.
Eyal Hareuveni
Alan Ernst (piano), Jon Raskin (alto saxophone)
