In the Moment: Improvisations and Compositions

John Hemmersam (Denmark) and Asal Malekzadeh (Iran) can be heard on this recording playing acoustic guitars and daf respectively. The liner notes are authored by Hemmersam himself and report that the two had never met prior to getting together in 2018 for this session, featuring wholly impromptu performances. This being the case, I believe both they and Naxos World should be applauded for having the grit to release such material in a market that is almost completely ruled by the dictates of digital studio technology, often resulting in hugely overproduced soulless soul music.

That being said, it seems that although this duo perform competently on their instruments, testimony to the fact that both Hemmersam and Malekzadeh are established and respected in their respective fields, they seem not to share much in terms of a common musical heritage. Thus, there is no springboard by means of which to fly into the truly unexpected and the music necessarily results in these impressionistic non-compositions. Engineer Niels Praestholm jumps in on double bass on ‘Menliz’, adding a welcome low end to a track that starts freely, settles into a pulse, reaches a lovely rhythmic climax and breaks down again into a free-form ending.