Lisa Cay Miller. 682/681

Recorded in one day-long session, this CD has Vancouver composer and pianist Lisa Cay Miller matching tones and techniques with ten Amsterdam-based improvisers in duo or trio configurations. Although the twenty-two [!] meetings confirm her ability and adaptability, the few extended tracks provide more musical nourishment than do the briefer foretastes. For instance, the concluding “Onno, Wilbert,” with bassist Wilbert DeJoode and drummer Onno Govaert, serves up sliding keyboard tones, clip-clop percussion rolls, and buzzing bass drones that would fit on the menu of any jazz club. “Ig,” the pianist’s duet with violist Ig Henneman, contrasts accelerating, sharp, string spiccato with high-frequency but percussive keyboard chording to qualify these improvisations as new chamber music. Miller, fully conversant with electronics as a composer and a member of NOW Orchestra, manipulates flattened key stops on “Mark, Jasper” to corral guitar flanges from Mark Morse and Jasper Stadhouders respectively, and in the process becomes part of a constantly moving buoyant narrative. She also finagles complementary structures out of the vigorous multiphonics and near cacophony on “John,” featuring tenor saxophonist John Dikeman, and on “Mark,” with Morse. On the first, she mutes reed slurs by sneaking up on the saxophonist’s explosive outpourings with pedal-propelled power; on the second, she twangs enough inner-string clashes and scratches to blend with the guitar chording.