Ian Torres: The Legend Of The Prince Of Darkness?

Trying to describe the nature of Ian Torres' latest work, Comprovisation (Self Produced, 2025), with a single word, it would be intriguing. Presented on November 20, 2025 at the Fulton Street Collective in Chicago, the new album mixes spontaneous creation, unwritten composition and studio work. Here, radically acoustic timbres—tenor sax, trombone, drums and his own trumpet—meet the densely electronic sonorities of various synthesizers and drum samplers, utilized from the perspective of a carefully crafted contemporary avant-garde. To be sure, the trumpeter, composer and educator's public trajectory is as intermittent as it is surprising. It is not usual to go from leading a 17-member ensemble (the Ian Torres Big Band, 2008-2014) to the trumpet and synth-based DIY that nourishes, for the most part, that latest offering. But at the end of 2023 the multi-instrumentalist was already giving some clues of a significant reinvention with a handful of interesting singles published on streaming platforms: Comprovisation is the natural evolution of those ideas and practices.

With its opening track, "The Legend Of The Prince Of Darkness?," Torres pays an imaginative homage to Miles Davis, paradigm par excellence of musical mutation. His velvety trumpet and Jon Irabagon's grainy tenor sax interweave a suggestive counterpoint—the influence of Johann Sebastian Bach is glimpsed in his limited recorded output, directly or indirectly. Meanwhile, Greg Fundis' drums incisively punctuate both voices. Subtle electronics and doublings reinforce the stimulating sonic fabric, followed by Torres delivering an enticing solo where the shadow of Dave Douglas appears. The piece ends with a Davis sample belonging to an interview conducted in 1986. As Torres himself tells us: "I've always loved and respected Miles's constant sense of change he displayed throughout his entire lengthy career—his refusal to repeat himself and his commitment to always evolving." There is no doubt that he is also applying these brave musical principles to himself.

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