Roscoe Mitchell

Internationally renowned musician and composer Roscoe Mitchell since Sound, his debut on Delmark in 1966, has defined a unique language based on a creative approach toward jazz and its relationship with contemporary music. Splatter, drawn from two concerts at the AngelicA Festival in Bologna in 2017, presents the most recent developments of this research. Here are two pieces from his cycle "Conversations for large orchestra". A project based on the transcription and orchestration of some pure collective improvisations with pianist Craig Taborn and drummer Kikanju Baku ("Conversations I and II" Wide Hive, 2014). This new CD includes the Italian premiere of "Splatter" and the world premiere of "Distant Radio Transmission", featuring the Orchestra del Comunale di Bologna, plus singer Thomas Buckner and Mitchell himself. The lion's share of this CD is represented by the first-ever duet with Francesco Filidei, Italian church organist and former assistant of Jean Guillou at Saint-Eustache's Church in Paris, as well as a composer whose music has been performed by great ensembles such as Ensemble Intercontemporain, Percussions de Strasbourg, and Klangforum Wien. "Breath and Pipes" is a testament to this encounter: as Joshua Marshall writes in the CD liner notes, it is "an improvisatory tour de force, demonstrating the uncanny sort of electrokinetic thrill which emerges out of the capacity of two brilliant improvisers to truly surprise one another."