Tàradh

Although the quartet have been making music together since 2006, this is Simon Tacker's Ritmata's debut album. It is worth the wait. Tàradh is the Gaelic term for the premonitory echo of an absent person, which guitarist and composer Simon Thacker feels describes his personal experience of creating music, as if the music comes from outside of him.

The contributions of three of Scotland's most versatile jazz musicians – pianist Paul Harrison, drummer Stuart Brown and bassist Andrew Robb – ensure the album sits in that fecund territory where Western classical and jazz meet. However, flamenco and Indian forms are prominent too, with helpful liner notes discussing the rich end result.

Nine tracks are composed or re-imagined by a mostly centre-stage Thacker, the tight sound-tapestry loosening up regularly with passages of group improvisation. As is usual for a Thacker album (he's released several with other groups), there is one especially quirky track. On Tàradh this would be ‘Taijasa’, largely improvised and involving prepared guitar and extended percussion. Another highlight is Sephardic song ‘Muero Yo de Amor’, sung in Ladino by Spanish guest, cantadora Ángeles Toledano, while the impressive ‘Quadriga in 5’ has already been nominated for The Ivors Composer Award.