Salenta Baisden, Topu Lyo

*2024 reissue* Salenta and Topu met serendipitously in the summer of 2019 at a mutual friend’s apartment in Bedstuy. They talked about jamming as they left the small gathering; and months later, they ended up in Salenta’s friend’s recording studio in Bushwick. The studio had amazing gear and was perfectly treated. Ironically, they could not get the software to work so they ended up recording everything acoustically on an old recorder. Months later Salenta adopted an old beautiful spinet piano which had not been tuned in over 20 years. Although the piano was out of tune to western standards, it still had a very unique vibration and tune of its own. Outside of the first recordings in Bushwick, Topu and Salenta continued these jam sessions at Salenta’s apartment. Because of the odd tune of the piano, Topu tuned his cello down to match the intonation of the piano’s vibration. Together, Topu and Salenta improvised countless compositions, seventeen which are included in this album.