NIK BÄRTSCH — Hishiryō Piano Solo (2002) Serie Ritual Groove Music – 3 | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Among the earliest extant albums by Swiss musician and philosopher Nik Bärtsch, Hishiryo is described by the artist as an ongoing project for prepared piano and percussion that first manifested itself in 2001 and was recorded for release on the Tonus label in January 2002. Like much of his oeuvre, each of its eight episodes is titled with the word "Modul," which is German for "Module." This is the artist's preferred designation for his steadily increasing body of works. Whether conceiving for soloist or ensemble, Bärtsch's way of putting musical ideas together tends toward what he describes as "architecturally organized space...governed by the principles of repetition and reduction as well as by interlocking rhythms." Some of the modules visited on this album are ruminative, while others are bracingly propulsive, with Bärtsch employing a technique that brings to mind the breathtaking intensities employed by the Algerian pianist/drummer/bandleader Raphaël Schecroun (1926-1998), who made most of his records under the name Errol Parker. "Hishiryo" is a Zen Buddhist term definable as the state in which one transcends thought so as to merge with the absolute. Its usage here confirms Bärtsch's profound alignment with the philosophy of John Cage (who was the originator of the prepared piano as an art form), and also indicates a deeply rooted organic solidarity with intuitive musicians such as Muhal Richard Abrams, Anthony Braxton, Ishmael Wadada Leo Smith, and Pauline Oliveros. Further parallels can and should be drawn with Harry Partch, Ornette Coleman, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and self-described "transboundary sound and visual artist" Yoshio Machida. This marvelous set of rituals for prepared piano and percussion is the ideal prologue to Bärtsch's subsequent ensemble realizations. It is highly recommended for window washing, floor scrubbing, white sage smudging, and any other methodology used to straighten out the vibe in one's living space. For less active listening, try it after adding a few drops of eucalyptus oil to your bathwater. arwulf arwulf
Tracklist :
1    Modul 8_9    6:13
2    Modul 13    7:15
3    Modul 14    3:30
4    Modul 4    5:48
5    Modul TM (Based On Lennie Tristanos «Turkish Mambo»)    2:27
6    Modul 5    6:55
7    Modul 6    4:04
8    Modul 11    5:46
Credits :
Piano [Prepared], Percussion, Composed By, Arranged By, Producer – Nik Bärtsch

NIK BÄRTSCH'S RONIN - Stoa (2006) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

He may call it "Zen Funk," but the real question is, what the hell is it? Swiss pianist and composer Nik Bartsch's Ronin have issued their ECM debut, Stoa, the label well-known for its icy sounding, spacious jazz. ECM has been pushing the envelope for nearly 40 years, but with Ronin, they've pushed it beyond the pale into God knows what. This is not a bad thing, however. Ronin was a group created with the idea of playing live. And over the course of three previous records issued only in Europe, the band -- birthed in 2001 when Bartsch was 30 -- plays a highly disciplined style of music that relies on interlocking rhythm, groove, and groups of tight, short melodic statements all stacked on top of one another. There are those who will immediately think of Steve Reich's minimalist discipline, but there are no equations to be solved here. It's math music to be sure, but its also got the good foot, the deep bass, and the drum ostinatos of James Brown & His Famous Flames or the JB's, or even the deep soul tight backbeat toughness of the best Stax rhythm sections. Bartsch has listened to everything from Reich and Terry Riley to techno and the Necks (there is a beautiful nod to them at the beginning of the opener "Modul 36"). Bartsch's melodic ideas are trance-like and hypnotic. They come across more as rhythmic statements than actual melodic ideas. There are Eastern aesthetics at work here in the stripped-down elementalism in this music. It's full of discipline and is depersonalized so that the ensemble comes off as one voice. It's clear Bartsch has spent time listening to some of the best experimental electronic music by artists such as Apparat, Thomas Brinkmann, Pole, Basic Channel, and Pan Sonic. And while there is improvisation in Ronin's attack, it's structured and tightly woven into Bartsch's compositional structures. What makes the band tick is the rhythm section as Bartsch works his modulated and shuffled lyrical fragments against the section, assisted ably and minimally by Sha on contrabass and bass clarinets (who acts as another part of the rhythm section more than as a soloist or melodist). It's bassist Bjorn Meyer, percussionist Andi Pupato, and especially the brilliant drummer Kaspar Rast making it all happen in real time. Bartsch plays a standard concert grand, but he also uses a Fender Rhodes. There is a sleek chrome and matte black, post-postmodernist, Euro-funky attack in sections of "Modul 33." It begins with a near dissonant ambience -- created by small percussion instruments and bell-like gongs -- that David Toop would cream over. But it's toward the center where the action is: Bartsch puts the overdrive in his left-hand work in the middle register in a series of modulations that start from the middle of a melody and work both forward and back, always returning to a center that is really the only constant. The popping hi hat and hushed snare usher in Sha, who shines here with his breath control and taut, stuttering, articulate blend of rhythm and harmonics that -- reminiscent of Roland Kirk in the '70s -- create a locking groove for Bartsch to play short, fleeting chords before beginning his knotty theme contrapuntally against the rhythm section. There is nothing extra in this music, no room for metaphor or metonymy or the self-expression jazz has at its center for soloists. Time signatures shift methodically, and the reined in groove becomes the entire proceeding. The piano and stick work of Rast create the loping, hard, trance airlock that is "Modul 38 _17," the set closer. Over 12 minutes in length, the listener is pulled into one sphere or the other, that of the piano or the percussion, though both come to the same middle to reach outward. What sounds like a loop is actually played live without overdubbing or editing. Bartsch plays both Rhodes and acoustic piano, one in each hand, covering the ground as Sha, Meyer, and Pupato create their own series of continuous hypno-grooves. Bartsch shifts the melodic idea or stacks and cuts it as the piece evolves, becoming ever more pronounced and forceful, leaving the listener exhausted by its end. While it is an utter pleasure to listen to these five long pieces -- nothing is less than nine minutes here, which shows just how this music is played live and to experience the taut control and the tenacity it takes to play this music in a concert setting. Stoa may not be jazz, or "Zen Funk," it may not be anything at all, and yet, that is what makes Ronin's Stoa such a powerful and illuminating experience. It's one of those recordings that can be enjoyed by more open-minded jazz fans, but the true audience for Stoa lies in fans of the Necks (nothing quite so blissful here though, folks) and experimental techno fans if they can get past the notion that all this music is made live. ECM has raised the bar once more by recording and releasing a truly compelling, curious, maddening, and provocative Edition of Creative Musicians with Stoa. Ronin is a band of the future, one that has nowhere to go but out into the sonic stratosphere. Judging by this set, it will be exciting to witness where they go from here.
(This comment is posted on Allmusic by Thom Jurek, follower of our blog 'O Púbis da Rosa')
Tracklist :
1    Modul 36 15'17
(Nik Bärtsch)
2    Modul 35 9'11
(Nik Bärtsch)
3    Modul 32 9'33
(Nik Bärtsch)
4    Modul 33 10'42
(Nik Bärtsch)
5    Modul 38_17 12'30
(Nik Bärtsch)
Nik Bärtsch's Ronin   
Nik Bärtsch   Piano, Fender Rhodes
Sha   Bass Clarinet, Alto Saxophone
Björn Meyer   Bass
Kaspar Rast   Drums
Andi Pupato   Percussion            

NIK BÄRTSCH'S RONIN - Holon (2008) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Pianist Nik Bärtsch's Zurich quintet Ronin has released a handful of recordings, but Holon is only the second released in the United States. When Stoa was issued in 2006, it was like this startling blast of air. Was it jazz? Was it minimalist classical music? Was it acoustic techno? Bärtsch calls it "zen funk." OK, fair enough, but in actuality, while it bears traces and borrows elements from all of the aforementioned genres, Ronin is its own animal, its own sound, its own complex yet utterly accessible musical identity or, better, brand. They have toured relentlessly all over the world, and as a result, this quintet is not only well seasoned, but also it has taken the music up the ladder a couple of rungs. Stoa revealed the taut, interlocking pulses, rhythms, and grooves, all stacked atop one another with nearly mathematical precision. Given the trance-like nature of some of it, it was easy to get hypnotized and allow its subtler elements, those having to do with improvisation, however tightly scripted, into the various sections of its numbered "moduls," as Bärtsch calls his compositions, as if they are all of a piece. The Ronin personnel have not undergone changes since Stoa: Sha, bass clarinets, alto saxophone; Andi Pupato, percussion; Kaspar Rast, drums; Björn Meyer, drums. Most of these players have been with Bärtsch since the beginning and as a unit have learned to trust one another to keep frames in this music while allowing for a certain looseness that makes it more physical, more driven, and consequently more intuitive and intimate: check the breakbeats and Bärtsch's solo on "Modul 41_17," where Sha moves the pulse by pitch from one sphere to the next and Bärtsch plays between the pulse and breakbeats of Rast. Basslines and percussive elements are rumbling under, pushing toward who knows what, but it's going somewhere. It actually "rocks" more than rolls, but the tension is exquisite, so much so that when Pupato introduces a cowbell and some other brighter percussion instruments in certain places, it startles the listener, like a minor shock. It is only then one realizes that the groove is mutated, shifted, turned toward another rhythmic sphere -- Meyer's carrying more notes in his groove now -- another set of pitches and contrasts and groove without the pulse seeming to change at all.

Philip Glass this isn't. Steve Reich this isn't. Mogwai on pianos or Thomas Brinkmann with jazz instruments this might be. At the end of over 14 minutes, one is almost relieved for the quietly elliptical beginning of "Modul 39_8," where a single piano chord mysteriously creeps out from the shadow, carrying a bit of it into the left- and right-hand chords, before a shimmering rim shot ushers in a pulse that gradually becomes sinister, brooding, yet also as beautiful as a moonlit pool that is seemingly still on the surface but is roiling with activity beneath. Different rhythmic statements come from Pupato and Rast as Bärtsch goes his own way, investigating a sparse melodic ideal to see how it looks in light of the grooves coming together in the middle. The bassline is a simple note, pulsed -- until it changes, and the entire thing becomes a funky dance lock; here is where breaks, piano as a real percussion instrument, and a popping electric bassline move the listener toward funk regardless of where she was at during the beginning of the piece. Dynamic elements change course over its duration no less than four times, as do harmonic engagements of what is truly polymetric invention, and transforms itself into an Eastern modal groove without losing its danceable edge. By the final cut, "Modul 44," which begins with nearly a full minute of silence, very quiet bells jingling before Bärtsch and the group enter fully and immediately, seemingly in the middle of a phrase, but as Sha begins to allow the lyric line pattern to emerge, Bärtsch suddenly comes at it from an entirely different angle, playing another repetition, changing nuances between the left and right hands, shading his chords, and after another short, skeletally spacious break, Sha begins his own solo, followed by an emerging bassline that echoes the same melodic line but louder, rumbling -- never booming -- over everything. In the mix, drums and bass are out front, piano, percussion, and reeds are hovering in the backdrop, shimmering with ostinatii and minimal arpeggios before kicking into a different kind of high gear where everything is in your face. Uh huh, this is on-the-good-foot music. The most beautiful thing about Holon is how "live" it all feels. You can see in the mind's eye and fully hear this music in a setting where an audience is urging the band on, not just listening, but moving. How much better does it get than that? The more things stay the same in Ronin, the more they change.
(This comment is posted on Allmusic by Thom Jurek, follower of our blog 'O Púbis da Rosa')
Tracklist :
1    Modul 42 6'27
(Nik Bärtsch)
2    Modul 41_17 14'51
(Nik Bärtsch)
3    Modul 39_8 7'59
(Nik Bärtsch)
4    Modul 46 7'16
(Nik Bärtsch)
5    Modul 45 9'41
(Nik Bärtsch)
6    Modul 44 9'23
(Nik Bärtsch)
Credits :
Nik Bärtsch's Ronin   
Nik Bärtsch   Piano, Fender Rhodes
Sha   Bass Clarinet, Alto Saxophone
Björn Meyer   Bass
Kaspar Rast   Drums
Andi Pupato   Percussion  

NIK BÄRTSCH'S RONIN - Llyrìa (2010) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

The third album from one of the most exciting young European bands, “Llyrìa” follows on from “Stoa” and “Holon”, the recordings that established Swiss band Ronin on the international scene. Leader Nik Bärtsch’s “modular” pieces still define the context of the group’s music but the committed input of the individual Ronin members has lifted the work to the next level, blurring the distinctions between composition, improvisation and interpretation. The music has become more open, so much so that Bärtsch’s old buzzwords like “Zen funk” and “ritual groove music” now scarcely apply and even “minimalism” is only a distant reference. Reed player Sha shines brightly here, and lyrical melodic themes make themselves felt, but perhaps this is, more than its predecessors, a drummer’s record, its beats lovingly crafted by Kasper Rast and percussionist Andi Pupato. ecm
Tracklist :
1    Modul 48 7:00
2    Modul 52 8:18
3    Modul 55 8:40
4    Modul 47 8:02
5    Modul 53 6:55
6    Modul 51 9:53
7    Modul 49_44 7:22
Nik Bärtsch's Ronin   
Nik Bärtsch   Piano, Fender Rhodes
Sha   Bass Clarinet, Alto Saxophone
Björn Meyer   Bass
Kaspar Rast   Drums
Andi Pupato   Percussion      

NIK BÄRTSCH'S RONIN - Live (2012) 2CD | FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Ronin around the world: a powerful and atmospheric concert recording with music captured in Germany, Austria, Holland, England, and Japan, a double-album which transmits the live impact of Nik Bärtsch’s band and its enveloping modular groove music of interlocking rhythms. It’s also a set that marks the end of an era and the transition into a new one. These are the last recordings of Ronin with Björn Meyer’s elegantly-leaping bass guitar as one of the lead voices, and Bärtsch views the album as partly a tribute to Meyer’s long tenure with the band. New bassist Thomy Jordi, meanwhile, makes an impressive entrance on “Modul 55”, but it’s most often the whole band, as a unified field of force, that commands the listener’s attention. ecm
Tracklist 1 :
1    Modul 41_17 - Lörrach 16'38
(Nik Bärtsch)
2    Modul 35 - Leipzig 11'31
(Nik Bärtsch)
3    Modul 42 - Wien 8'09
(Nik Bärtsch)
4    Modul 17 - Tokyo 5'58
(Nik Bärtsch)
5    Modul 22 - Amsterdam 14'45
(Nik Bärtsch)
Tracklist 2 :
1    Modul 45 - Mannheim 13'11
(Nik Bärtsch)
2    Modul 48 - Gateshead 8'37
(Nik Bärtsch)
3    Modul 47 - Mannheim 13'11
(Nik Bärtsch)
4    Modul 55 - Salzau 10'00
(Nik Bärtsch)
Nik Bärtsch's Ronin   
Nik Bärtsch   Piano, Fender Rhodes
Sha   Bass Clarinet, Alto Saxophone
Björn Meyer   Bass
Kaspar Rast   Drums
Andi Pupato   Percussion    

NIK BÄRTSCH'S MOBILE - Continuum (2016) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Swiss pianist and composer Nik Bärtsch and his band Ronin grabbed the attention of the international jazz world with four acclaimed ECM recordings between 2006 and 2012. The group's trademark sound lies in minimal, interlocking, contrapuntal, polyrhythmic grooves that Bärtsch defines as "zen funk," played on piano, percussion, and electric bass. It is not only listenable, but at times, actually danceable. But Ronin's roots lie in Mobile, an earlier Bärtsch ensemble that cut two albums -- Ritual Groove Music in 2004 and Aer in 2006 -- before this one. The composer's approach to rhythm, skeletal harmony, counterpoint, and repetition is different but holistic -- everywhere evident in both. The pianist's Mobile features bassist Kaspar Rast (on acoustic upright), and reed multi-instrumentalist Sha (both Ronin regulars), as well as percussionist Nicholas Stocker. Sha plays clarinets exclusively. His function, in direct contrast to his frontline role in Ronin, is as a tonal center and rhythmic collaborator. The music on Continuum is more deliberate, ritualistic -- it's still anchored in grooves but they're less obvious. The discipline of this band is legendary in Switzerland: its earliest incarnation could perform Bärtsch's hypnotic compositions for 36 hours straight.

The album offers revisionings of six pieces from his and Ronin's catalogs, and two new works. Articulating his ongoing obsession with late 20th century classical composition, Bärtsch also scripted a string quartet into three pieces. "Modul 18" contains brushed snare, tuned percussion, and strident basslines to create a dark vibe. The piano, strings, and percussion introduce various low-end modes in a trance-inducing groove. "Modul 8_11" has its funk entrenched in a bass clarinet pulse that acts as a second bassline. Bärtsch offers a linear chordal statement, while shades and colors are added and subtracted almost imperceptibly. Stocker's percussion extends their parameters and the bassline bridges them. The brooding jazz in "Modul 12" is spacier, utilizing softly brushed snares, round-toned cymbals, kalimbas, and occasional piano chords as tonal centers for the rhythms. "Modul 5" contains sharply contrasting contrapuntal statements. They arrive in rounds through the piano's lower middle and high registers. Rast contributes limited modal phrases, while fleet, tapping, high-tuned percussion deceptively offers the impression of a second piano. Though the cycle repeats continually, the music changes constantly. "Modul 44," with strings, is the most gradual piece here. Stocker plays solo for nearly a minute before piano and strings enter; three more pass before they commence playing in ascendant and descendant cycles, accompanied by snare. When the bass and bass clarinet finally enter, the composition's tension, pulse, and tonal variation have already increased in dimension. Here, Mobile's music may appear more static than Ronin's. But that's deceptive. Continuum is European jazz rife with funkiness; it's just more specific sound. It may require a closer listen, at least initially, but once experienced, its depth and constancy are unmistakable.
(This comment is posted on Allmusic by Thom Jurek, follower of our blog 'O Púbis da Rosa')
Tracklist :
1    Modul 29_14 8'58
(Nik Bärtsch)
2    Modul 12 9'01
(Nik Bärtsch)
3    Modul 18 8'02
(Nik Bärtsch)
4    Modul 5 8'31
(Nik Bärtsch)
5    Modul 60 9'27
(Nik Bärtsch)
6    Modul 4 5'25
(Nik Bärtsch)
7    Modul 44 10'23
(Nik Bärtsch)
8    Modul 8_11 8'32
(Nik Bärtsch)
Credits :
Nik Bärtsch   Piano
Sha   Bass Clarinet, Contrabass Clarinet
Kaspar Rast   Drums, Percussion
Nicolas Stocker   Drums, Tuned Percussion
Etienne Abelin   Violin
Ola Sendecki   Violin
David Schnee   Viola
Solme Hong   Cello
Ambrosius Huber   Cello