Craig Taborn - Avenging Angel (2011) [Hi-Res]

"If the areas of improvisation that I deal with are always `compositional' in a certain sense, in this case a very focussed compositional approach is applied, rather than allowing a broader exploration to yield a result. Throughout this recording I'm honing in on specific details. The music is really improvised: I just start. But having started, I try to relate everything that happens, like the motivic or rhythmic and textural detail, to the initial ideas as closely as I can. In terms of my own playing I try to have things emerge from the musical material itself. And a lot of that can depend on the instrument, too [in Lugano, a Steinway D]: the sound of the piano itself and what it is generating. I'm interested in the history of piano music, certainly, but I'm not hearing the instrument quite in those terms. I'm experiencing it also as a pure sound source, very aware of the tones and the overtones and how the instrument is ringing. This music is not about `transcending the piano' as much as it is about working with what is possible within it. "