Gregorio / Smith / Bryerton: The Cold Arrow

Maybe the surprise release of 2021 was the trio recording Room Of The Present (Fundacja Słuchaj!). Adventurous bassist Damon Smith and percussionist Jerome Bryerton have had a long working relationship as a duo, in various groups and settings, large and small. Adding the clarinetist and composer Guillermo Gregorio was quite the revelation. The trio is back with a new studio session, ten tracks of which only two were composed. Still, one might get the impression that all were taken from a score sheet, i.e., that the improvising is locked in.

Gregorio was an early adopter of the music of Warne Marsh and Lee Konitz. As a citizen of Argentina, thousands of miles from New York, his investigations and experiments in sound were akin to those of another isolated genius, Bengt Nordstrom of Sweden. He developed a unique sound before moving to Europe and eventually America. Gregorio brings that distinctive voice to this session, one that is chock-full of conversational clarinet passages and what baseball commentators would call 'small-ball' accompaniment by Smith and Bryerton. The musicians do not swing for the fences, they work in smaller units. Bryerton performs sans drums, only with gongs, metal pieces and cymbals. Smith modulates his signature physical attack in favor of a restrained approach. The tracks are disciplined and thoughtful improvisations. Bryerton favors cymbal scrape and the sound bath of bowls and gongs while Smith plucks muted notes and pulls his bow with an imperturbable peace. The sounds may be created in a small-ball fashion, but they produce big results,