I had a worrying moment when I couldn't find this CD on the shelf next to my other ASK CDs (1, 2). At first I couldn't think where else it could be, then I had a sift through my growing pile of 'recent purchases', the CDs that I still need to get acquainted with before they get filed away. Except there isn't space to file them on the shelves as they stand. That's always the way: you move into a new house, organise the shelves to accommodate the existing collection neatly, overlooking the inevitable acquisition of further CDs that will need to fit into the categories that have been created.
Anyway, I found Acoustic Quartet 2006 in that pile. How recent is 'recent purchases'? Over a year as it turns out, mid-August last year, when it was one of three I ordered from the Discus website. I always buy in threes, as explained previously.
As for the music, ASK's third CD sees them shape-shifting yet again. This is neither the electronic duo of Disconnected Bliss nor the mixed ensemble of The Formulary of Curses (which I need to listen to again). This time we have, you guessed it, an acoustic quartet, comprising the two ASK principals plus Angela Rosenfeld on cello and Charlie Collins on vibraphone, waterphone and mbira (Rosenfeld didn't appear on previous ASK recordings; Collins did, but on wind instruments, not percussion). They play five live improvisations at Sheffield's Red Deer. Sometimes I like free improv; sometimes I don't. This CD, on this listening, I love. There's a real sense of the sounds unfurling in the moment. Collins' percussion really makes it for me, and the other players exercise the discretion to shut up and just leave him to it from time to time.
Despite my resolution not to buy more CDs than I have to (have to?), my sentimental sense of connection with the Sheffield improv scene, which began 22 years ago, has just led me to order another three.
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