The French free-improvising trio of drummer Tiri Carreras (founder of the XoNdZf collective), his long-time collaborator, tenor sax player Sylvain Guérineau (who has played with Sunny Murray, Benjamin Duboc, and Jean Marc Foussat), and double bass player Fred Marty (who has recorded a duo album with Guérineau) dedicated its album to tall trees, as the cover and the titles of the four imply. This collective trio immediately soars high with Ornette Coleman-inspired instant melodic lines and passionate, uplifting rhythmic energy. T(h)ree Volume 1 was recorded by Marty in Montbarrois in February 2026.
Guérineau often uses bird-call sounds and opts for fast, succinct phrases à la John Zorn as he suggests melodic lines for the trio; Carreras propels as he sculpts nuanced pulse or structures loose rhythmic architectures that often can be quite chaotic and completely free; and Marty attempts to ground this open and intense, free-associative flow in coherent courses. Guérineau articulates an evocative, soulful, and folk-like melody on «Coupe Rase», which is immediately abstracted by Carreras and Marty’s colourful yet hypnotic pulse. The 19-minute «Séquoia», which ends the album, captures the essence of this trio – collective, intuitive, organic dynamics that patiently expand melodic threads into a full-blown, unpredictable, mysterious, and infectiously immersive rhythmic texture that highlights the strong-minded, rich voices of Carreras, Guérineau, and Marty, as they charm these tall trees.
Carreras and Guérineau’s duo album Al-Shifa expresses their immediate outrage following the destruction of Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza, the largest and most important medical complex in the Gaza Strip, by Israel during the Gaza war, with cover artwork in the colours of the Palestinian flag. The eight pieces suggest free jazz and free improvisation as forms of resistance and solidarity, offering beauty and soulful, fiery music as an antidote to futile, lethal violence. The album was recorded at the Villa Palma in Côtes d’Armor studio and in the Gâtinais in Montbarrois in 2024 and 2025.
Carreras and Guérineau, on the bass clarinet, offer a mournful, exceptionally lyrical reading of Ornette Coleman’s iconic «Lonely Woman». Carreras’ open approach to rhythm and sound, shaped as a flexible, tangible material, and Guérineau’s gift for sketching instant melodies make Al-Shifa a deeply moving statement. The album ends with a lamenting cover of the French old chanson «Le Temps des cerises» (The Time of Cherries), associated with the Paris Commune of 1871, which introduced pioneering democratic and social reforms before it was brutally suppressed, cementing Carreras and Guérineau’s beautiful, complementary interplay.
Eyal Hareuveni
Tiri Carreras (drums), Sylvain Guérineau (tenor saxophone, bass clarinet), Fred Marty (double bass)
