c_RL – ‘Friends’

Toronto’s contemporary classical music scene, which also flies the “new music” banner, is a flourishing garden of interesting sounds that exists (for me, anyway) in the interstitial avenues between genres. Demolished jazz, squelchy electronics, chamber music, mutated dance rhythms, and a plethora of other deconstructed forms are all mauled, mixed and mangled by a host of composer/improvisers into a vibrant oeuvre that defies categorization. Multi-instrumentalist Allison Cameron, percussionist Germaine Liu and trumpeter Nicole Rampersaud are just three of the talented Torontonians emitting thought-provoking tones in this exciting (non-)idiom. In trio form, they exist as c_RL, an exploratory group interested in unique timbres and extended techniques. With Friends, the crew offers up up eleven pieces of varying duration, each of which is a finely-assembled yet playful parade of sound. Liu is constantly on point; even when it sounds like the contents of my cupboard are being scattered across the room, there’s a rhythmic pulse tugging my brain back into its bony home. Whether it’s with electronics or strings or who-knows-what, Cameron is able to coax multifarious streams of sound that play nicely with Rampersaud’s finely honed trumpet passages. Throughout, the three performers craft a music that is free from form, yet far from formless; it’s a writhing ball of synergy resulting from a trio of individuals deeply attuned with one another and with themselves.

Friends can be acquired digitally via Bandcamp.