The Geometry quartet- vocal artist Kyoko Kitamura, cornetist Taylor Ho Bynum, guitarist Joe Morris, and cellist Tomeka Reid, opens a door to a new brave sonic universe that only exists in real-time composition. The four musicians are idiosyncratic and daring improvisers and all are affiliated with the great Anthony Braxton – Kitamura is the executive director for the Braxton’s Tri-Centric Foundation in charge of the Braxton75 Living Archive Project, Ho Bynum has collaborated with Braxton along the last decades, Morris recorded before with Braxton (including the 4-discs box «Four Improvisations», Clean Feed, 2007) and Reid has been a key
member of Braxton’s ensembles.
«Geometry of Distance» is the sophomore album of this quartet, following «Geometry of Caves» (Relative Pitch, 2018), emphasizing the development of the intricate, experimental interplay of this super creative quartet. The seven pieces stress the democratic interplay and a strong sense of communal, deep listening improvisation that often transforms into a mature composition, The Geometry quartet – intentionally – blurs the distinctions between real and imagined languages, clear musical ideas, random noises, and silences. And, as expected, these pieces offer complex textures, accumulating into a provocative but highly rewarding journey.
On «Space Chat’» Kitamura tells a suggestive story in an unintelligible language, backed by the lyrical playing of ho Bynum while contested by the atonal lines of Morris and Reid. The short improvisations, «The Erstwhile», «The Zoo Hypothesis» and «Magnificient Desolation» focus on free-associative, more urgent and engaging interplay, highlighting the theatrical-operatic delivery of Kitamura. «Veil of Imagination» patiently and quietly explores its delicate, enigmatic-kaleidoscopic universe, while «Sun Gazing» alternates between a restless and tense atmosphere and an almost silent, meditative one. The last, 16-minutes of «Bravery’s Consequence» distills all the previous, improvising strategies into an effective texture that revolves around a few gestures and instantly matures into an imaginative, detailed composition.
Eyal Hareuveni
Joe Morris (g), Tomeka Reid (c), Taylor Ho Bynum (cor), Kyoko Kitamura (v)
