Alternating Currents Live presents The Bridge #2.10

Nick Mazzarella—alto saxophone
Tim Stine—guitar
Céline Rivoal—accordion
Katie Ernst—double bass, voice
Sylvain Lemêtre—percussions

In anticipation. What is the anticipation, since 2018 that this formation was envisioned? How do you talk about things and unknown music in anticipation? By daring to dream? Of a disconcerting concerto for alto saxophone, accordion, guitar, double bass, and percussion? Of all the ensembles to have crossed this transatlantic bridge, this one promises to be one of the most radiant. Rays of black light, and rays of white light, and rays of all shapes in light and shadow. The domain of all five of them: the realm of the possible, that of hallucinatory hallucinations, with a considerable degree of subtlety, color and texture. With the freedom and prolixity one associates with so-called jazz music (but which, exactly?), the intricacy and assurance one associates with so-called contemporary music (but which, exactly?), the clarity and strangeness one associates with so-called traditional music (but which, exactly?), and all of it jumbled together, since we're also talking about open music.

Let's listen to a story, a matter of sharing musical histories between two contemporary cultures, as recounted by one of the members of this forthcoming ensemble, Sylvain Lemêtre: "Moving forward and taking sideways steps are two seemingly opposite attitudes, but ultimately necessary to move forward. I've always taken the roundabout route, I've always liked to thwart frontiers, and it's necessary for me to be nourished by musical encounters and explorations. Everything is created through movement. And for me, creation is a necessity, requiring me to direct movement in multiple directions, at the risk of sometimes getting lost in it, but doesn't chance come from this freedom of movement? We could say that the greater the movement, the more fruitful the chance, couldn't we? 6646 km of distance for me with Chicago, that's promising! Let's provoke chance and reap the fruits of its promises: the experience of encounter offered by The Bridge is a real opportunity for us French musicians. And this encounter is perhaps more important than the result of the encounter itself. It was this realization that led me to agree to cross The Bridge. To let myself be taken on board by The Bridge team in order to thwart the supposed boundaries between what improvisation is in Chicago and our more recent French history of improvisation. We're not the elders of jazz and all the music that stems from it. I often look across the Atlantic. They prepared the ground. And we've been cultivating it ever since. We've found that legitimacy, and some of us are well and truly emancipated from our contemporary classical music. It's taken a certain rigor and determination, and we've had to resist and fight to create spaces of freedom. Perhaps this is because our music has gradually lost its social function, and is now rarely used for political action?"

The Bridge is supported by Ministère de la Culture, Sacem, Centre National de la Musique, Spedidam, Adami, Institut Français, Experimental Sound Studio & University of Chicago.