LCMF: Exhausted and Hysterical review – free improvisation at its most erudite

US saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell’s ears are perpetually open to scales, tunings and mantras from past western expertise. Most recognised for his pioneering work with the Artwork Ensemble of Chicago, Mitchell sealed the deal on this stimulating night on the London modern music competition with free improvisation at its most erudite and incisive. Strains coiled, pirouetted and multiplied as Mitchell locked himself right into a dialogue along with his saxophones, music evolving due to inside dialogue, by no means the small-talk of post-minimalist sample counting. Single be aware thought-bubbles turned progress on a dime, obliging him to view his mind-map of improvised traces from unexpected angles; innovations by flip summary, uncooked and funky. Rising all of a sudden from the again of the corridor, percussionist Kikanju Baku tapped rhythms readily available percussion as he wandered by means of the viewers in the direction of his drum package. Initially Mitchell met these challenges with restraint. Remoted hollers and staccato lip-smacks contoured Baku’s blasts of rhythm, earlier than Mitchell turned the tide the opposite method, flooding the house with a torrential outpouring of sound.

Roscoe Mitchell and Kikanju Baku at LCMF 2022.
Blasts of rhythm … percussionist Kikanju Baku (proper) with Roscoe Mitchell. Photograph: Dawid Laskowski/Dawid Laskowski Pictures 2018

Mitchell’s set was preceded by an prolonged sequence of experimental movie shorts by Stom Sogo, DJ units and a Fluxus traditional by Ben Patterson. A group of recent orchestral items, carried out by Jack Sheen, was topped by For Roscoe Mitchell by the US drummer and composer Tyshawn Sorey. Solo cello, dealt with with beautiful delicacy by Deni Teo, snaked round drones and pop-up orchestral clusters, the elliptical gorgeousness of atonal concord on full show. Sorey meticulously unpicked Mitchell’s tics, like writing down the recipe of all that makes his hero cook dinner.

The viewers acquired behind Sorey’s piece, the cogwheels of focus palpable. Two world premieres and LCMF commissions – from sound artist Elvin Brandhi and multimedia artist Cerith Wyn Evans – have been disappointing: neither had a lot thought what to do with a full orchestra, producing skinny gruel that left the musicians doodling aimlessly. The intriguingly titled Pearly, goldy, woody, bloody, or, Abundance by Oliver Leith smudged overtly bare tonal chords, gouging standard orchestration out from the within. Then turntablist Mariam Rezaei, in her set, relished pummelling the particles of acquainted melodic hooks and chords right into a delirious mad-dash of high-velocity sonic surrealism.

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