Santa Diver: Blue Horizon

With curious exotic energy, fierce Hungarian violinist Luca Kezdy and her Santa Diver trio-mates, bassist David Szesztay and drummer David Szego, steer around the multiple and multi-faceted components that enrich Blue Horizon. Immediately captivating, each of the six musical journeys the three embark upon proves Blue Horizon an arresting statement of artistic defiance and control which moves entirely at its own pace of exploration and discovery.

Akin to a new morning rise, "Blue Horizon" expands with all the promise, potential, and temptation wrought by each day. The piece opens quietly enough with Szesztay's symmetrical legato creating structure, creating space for Szegő's time-suspended percussion as Kezdy slowly, deliberately begins her seemingly ancient ruminations. A maelstrom of logistics given greater heft by Szesztay's effected rock sharp cadence, "Blue Horizon" could have gone way off the rails in many different, dissonant ways. The trio chose controlled tumult and we're all the better for it.

"68" boldly exclaims its thriving self with a rushing, circular (but never dead-ended) motif before Kezdy summonses her spiritual mentor. John , creating a rousing turmoil of plucked glissando and loops, soaring above yet firmly within the rhythm section's driving insistence. The mourning, meditative "Izland" finds Kezdy and Szesztay's intuitive sense of electronics, and the palette they provide, the air upon which Kezdy, in full dramatic voice, pulls from her violin the sound of ages, no epochs of human toil and persistence. The dreamy "Wintersong" follows, its first five minutes lulling listeners to the window to watch the snow fall before the corners of the window frame begin to fray. An ominous grey sets in like cloud cover as Kezdy brings the provoked winds and Szegő (as he does throughout Blue Horizon) manipulates the fusion with a keen, whip-cracking clarity, especially on "E.S.D." as he propels forward from an energetic Celtic reel to rock star solo and punch. A daring trio well worth investing time in, this is Santa Diver's fourth release since 2014 so those who like it have some serious catching up to do.