Reviews

The trio of Julian Argüelles (tenor), Ronan Guilfoyle (bass) and Jim Black (drums) finished their short Irish tour to launch their new CD, Live in Dublin, with a striking demonstration of their abilities, collectively and individually, in Bray, writes Ray Comiskey

This is a trio who approach each performance within a concert with an open mind. (There was one exception to that on Saturday, an encore of Charlie Parker's Segment, done straight-ahead and the closest they came to conventional playing all night.) Argüelles admitted early on, they don't know what they're going to play until they get into it. One or other of the trio will play around with an idea, another may respond to it or suggest a different musical direction, and the third may simply react or pin the free improvisation down to something firmer.

That was how the opening that eventually resolved itself into Ornette Coleman's Broadway Blues evolved, the bass suggesting the theme after considerable open dialogue between tenor and drums. Similar approaches yielded Evan's Freedom Park, a salute to the great free player, Evan Parker, Jim Black's Nile (assuming I've got the titles correct), Don Cherry's There is the Bomb and Guilfoyle's coruscating Tenski. It also yielded a beautiful ballad, so songlike and logical that it was a surprise to discover this was a spontaneously created trio improvisation.

That, in itself, is an indication of how acutely aware these players were of what they were doing and the nature of the dialogue going on between them.

All of these were lengthy improvisations, full of surprise, textural variety, beautifully nuanced dynamics and an uncanny collective sense of the dramatic arc of each performance. Even when the trio settled on a composed piece, the thematic material was treated with the utmost freedom, in effect becoming poles around which they spun widening threads of improvisation before returning to the original reference point.

In some hands this would be a recipe for self-indulgence. But the focus on each other's playing was so intense that this was not allowed to happen; any failure to listen would have meant the guilty one would have found himself cut adrift, at best irrelevant, at worst an impediment. And although, perhaps, Jim Black caught attention more frequently - he must be one of the most original and musical drummers ever to play here, with a staggering repertoire of sounds and devices to bring to the music - this was essentially a group performance, the product of a compelling chemistry between all three musicians in something like top form.