*** Miya Masaoka, Tom Nunn, Gino Robair

CREPUSCULAR MUSIC

(Rastascan)

The music on this disc sounds like nothing else you've ever heard. That's partly due to the line-up: koto, percussion, and an invented pair called bug and baboon. But it's what this co-operative trio of San-Francisco-based improvisers do with their instruments that counts. Masaoka is a major new voice, building a personal, contemporary music out of the ancient vocabulary of the koto. Nunn, using instruments of his own creation, is by definition in uncharted territory; Robair has developed his own voice within the aesthetic inherited from free-improvising percussionists of the past 30 years.

For more than 45 minutes, these three quietly manipulate the unusual timbres of their instruments. It's difficult to untangle the silken knot of the music to determine who is making what sound. But the result is consistently rewarding, from the play of light and shadow in the sonic space of the performance to the dancing irregular rhythmic patterns to the kaleidoscopic blend of dry thwacks, resonating wooden-bucket bonks, broom-bristle shushing, and a thousand other unidentifiable, mysterious sounds.

-- Ed Hazell