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"Clearings (“in libertà”) è una registrazione effettuata il 30 settembre del 2001 che documenta una storica sessione tra il sassofonista John Butcher, il violinista Christoph Irmer e il pianista Agustí Fernández. Non c'è apporto elettronico per una registrazione effettuata curiosamente nello stesso studio di Amburgo dove quarant’anni prima registrarono i Beatles. Solo “instant compositions”, composizioni realizzate con un processo definito dell’instant composing secondo il quale free, impro e eredità jazz o classica sono chiamate ad interagire in una incisione effettuata tale e quale è stata realizzata. Tre personalità con diversi back-ground, con prospettive impro-compositive diverse, con distinte sensibilità s’incontrano dunque e convergono ciascuno verso l’altro. Il pianista Fernández e il violinista Irmer hanno già registrato assieme. Irmer ha una discreta esperienza con musicisti dell’area impro, come il bassista Dominic Duval, il bassista tedesco Peter Kowald e il flautista Jane Rigler. Fernández vanta collaborazioni con William Parker ed Evan Parker. Di Butcher c’è poco da dire, è certamente uno dei sassofonisti più importanti della scena europea.

Quel che risulta dal loro incontro è una registrazione di grande interesse e spessore. Dal punto di vista musicale i tredici brani di Clearings sono un vero e proprio crescendo emotivo. Piano e violino sembrano tirare le fila verso territori più classici, laddove il sassofono spiega le maglie verso territori totalmente free, dissonanti e astratti. Ma è un gioco, perché le parti spesso s’invertono e i ruoli finiscono per scambiarsi. Così il piano di Fernández domina la scena, fermando o prolungando – con un interessante gioco di forte/piano – le mischie sonore dove s’intrecciano il sassofono di Butcher e il violino di Irmer. I movimenti sono ora rarefatti, ora terribilmente profondi e gravi. Punto d’arrivo ideale di Clearings è forse il brano più lungo “Prophecy”. Il sassofono di Butcher è spettrale, galleggia su lunghissime note tirate, laddove il piano di Fernández incede con tremoli sincopati e gli staccati al violino di Irmer creano una atmosfera profondamente nervosa, contratta, sentitamente potente. Di qui, si dispiegano le vele, i tre si accomiatano con gesti più rarefatti e astratti. Chiude il simbolico “arco del silenzio”, il gesto ritratto nella copertina, un commiato che sublima una registrazione davvero eccezionale. "

Lucia Caponi - Altri Suoni, Italy

"Mein Glückwunsch zu dieser Produktion."

Udo Schindler - Wörthsee, Germany

"Trans-European improv, CLEARINGS showcases a meeting of minds among musicians from three different countries with three distinct approaches to free music. Resulting in a substantial program of melding timbres, the CD confirms that only in a liberated musical situation like this could disparate styles meld.

As a matter of fact, if there was ever a complete misnomer, then it's the title of the second track, "Bumpy Ride". Here and elsewhere, the distinctive smeary trills of Britain's John Butcher morph into wiggling irregular vibrations and join the speedy spiccato bowing of Germany's Christoph Irmer and the dissonant, uneven note clusters of Spain's Agustí Fernández sans bumps. Both with classical training, pianist Fernández and violinist Irmer have recorded together before, while Irmer has also played with American bassist Dominic Duval and two of the pianist's collaborators German bassist Peter Kowald and American flautist Jane Rigler. Fernández's partners have ranged from American bassist William Parker to British reedist Evan Parker. Butcher who is universally acknowledged as the most important sax explorer since Parker, seems to have played with nearly everyone in improvised music from American drummer Gerry Hemingway to German synthesizer whiz Thomas Lehn.

There are no electronics in use on this session that took place in the same Hamburg studio where the Beatles recorded as Tony Sheridan's sidemen in 1961, nor do the techniques of pop ever interfere. Instead instant compositions like "Fire Stack" are featured. Here reed key pops, tongue slaps and colored air mix it up with ponticello bowing and the literal scratching of the fiddle's wood. Meanwhile Fernández forages in the piano innards, eventually encouraging legato glissandos to turn into straightforward harmonics -- which brings forth sibilant duck-like quacks from Butcher. Although there are times throughout when the two traditional instruments seem headed towards a formal recital stance, extended saxophone technique gets them back into the free music arena. Among the processes on offer are Fernández slapping and stopping the action of the piano strings, battering the keys with dynamic pressure, sounding the occasional bent note and leaping hopscotch-like over the keyboard. Irmer laterally saws away at his strings so that the tone begins to resemble that of a whining human voice. And he also creates elongated grating string pitches to accompany repeated piano arpeggios or irregularly pitched penny whistle vibrations from Butcher. As well as creating tiny, multi-note bird tweets from his soprano, the reedist at points also smears and snorts tenor sax lines.

"Siege" is a summation of many of these patterns, featuring the three polyphonically sounding out three separate but complementary lines. Measured violin harmonies, rumbling, bass piano lines and atmospheric horn honks combine with a minimum of friction.

Perhaps the summation of the trio's work comes on the aptly-named, longest track, "Prophecy". As Butcher's blaring spetrofluctuation, key pops and extended grainy slurs meet Fernández's syncopated tremolos and high frequency chording and Irmer's staccato fiddle lines that build makes the prophecy of a Pan-European music a reality.

At least in that neck of the improv woods, that prophecy seems to have been realized."

Ken Waxman - published on www.jazzweekly.com, June 2004

Ken Waxman - published on www.jazzword.com, June 2004

"Résultant de l'association inédite mais bien équilibrée de John Butcher (ss, ts), Christoph Irmer (vln) et Agustí Fernández (p) en septembre 2001, cet enregistrement séduit sur-le-champ : une musique évidente et aérée, acérée et déliée, ciselée en une douzaine de saynètes ou clairières, comme autant de précieux jardins. La création de ces espaces acoustiques contemporains doit autant au piano mélodique et fourrageur (le musicien espagnol, que l'on connaissait plus ' torrentiel ', commence à recevoir une juste reconnaissance, que ce soit dans le nouvel orchestre de Barry Guy ou avec l'ensemble électroacoustique d'Evan Parker, voire en duo avec ce dernier) qu'à l'agile violon, tantôt viennois, tantôt pointilliste ou chantant. Entouré de ces cordes (une matière qu'il affectionne, on le sait), le saxophoniste surligne les contours et infléchit les processus de ces ' compositions improvisées ' avec un remarquable sens du placement et de l'architecture.

Le plaisir d'audition naît des contrastes habilement ménagés entre délicatesse et robustesse dans cette musique européenne toute de netteté de découpage et d'articulation (qui n'est pas seulement due à un interplay un peu précautionneux). Impeccable !"

Guillaume Tarche, published in Improjazz n°105, May 2004

"Clearings, a great and unusual recording, delicate and filigree in places, robust in others, from John Butcher, Christoph Irmer and Agustí Fernández"

Peter Stubley, European Free Improvisation Pages, April 2004

"Free Improvisation is as much about community as it is about music. Stunning free improvisation intrigues me when you can feel that the needs of the individual are in perfect balance with the needs of the entirety. It allows the individual player to be totally present in one moment, and completely invisible in the other. You can be in the foreground and can submit to the whole when needed - and you're allowed to constantly shift between these extremes.

So the set of skills is completely different from those you needed in other musical contexts. They certainly have their own highest requirements: An orchestra playing a composition needs players who are able to follow the conductor simultaneously with the highest possible accuracy. A good dance band needs players where the time and rhythm are in perfect sync with each other and the crowd. An 'idiomatic' improvisation - as Derek Bailey calls improvisation in the context of jazz, rock, indian music, etc. - needs players who perfectly improvise within the rules of that particular idiom, or at least know how far they can go over the edge before the audience gets annoyed...

Free Improvisation - if done well - needs an interaction between the players, that allows you to apprehend every single player as well as the whole group. In this regard it makes no sense to compare Free Improvisation to any one of the other models I mentioned before.

'Clearings' is a masterpiece in this respect, made by three improvisers who rank among the finest in present day Europe. Agustí Fernández from Spain, Christoph Irmer from Germany and John Butcher from the UK come from three European countries, and all took off from different musical starting points, somewhere between jazz and classical music. On this CD three disparate musical personalities merge in a way that wouldn't probably be possible in any other music.

This CD offers a collection of music ranging from slow shifting layers of sound to rapid crisscrossing melodies, from traditional techniques to extended ones. The trio puts all these elements in perfect juxtaposition to each other. Let's look at 'Siege': Here John mainly draws growling noises out of his horn, Agusti plays taylor-esque runs and clusters, and Christoph provides a counterpoint with long bowed notes. While the latter keeps his instrument at a slow pace, the others assail each other with rapid firing sounds and melodies - creating a wonderful tension that keeps the listener caught throughout the piece.

Listen to the 'Traps', where the players leave a lot of space, each one jumps right in to put his quick reaction in juxtaposition to the others - only to create the next hook for someone else to grab. While you really feel the close attention the players pay to reacting fast, the piece keeps its slow motion and little density throughout. My favourite piece is the 'Owl', each player contributes his own part to the layers of sound that dominate the piece throughout. Listen how the players work on the little details in each sound. There is a lot going on within each layer, while a soft, almost romantic atmosphere is maintained throughout the piece.

There is a saying that sometimes you can´t see the forest for the trees. While many people talk about the aesthetic differences in music, these 'Clearings' open up the woods and shed new light on the other, the community realm of contemporary European improvised music."

Hans Tammen