With the Postage Paid Duets, Toronto musician David Sait brings us a remarkable collection of improvisation. His instrument, the guzheng (or Chinese zither), is rather unique in the improv world, and his platform for improvisation—by mail—also adds another layer of novelty to this collection of music.
Dubbed “time-delayed free improvisations,” the seven tracks find him collaborating with percussionist Gino Robair, saxophonist Glen Hall, and violinist LaDonna Smith in beautiful duet settings. It’s not entirely clear how the duets and recordings were facilitated—it seems most likely Sait recorded his performance solo and mailed it to his collaborators to improvise over—but the results are quite moving. The instrumentations are perfectly paired and each musician fills out each performance into a thoughtful piece of music that feels as if the duet was performed completely live.
