**** John Rapson

DANCES & ORATIONS

(Music & Arts)

For this fascinating album, trombonist John Rapson took an improvised duet with Anthony Braxton and used the tapes in a variety of ways to create new pieces. Some of the manipulations and combinations of live ensemble and tape are quite elaborate, and they all raise interesting questions about the nature of improvisation and composition. On "Scamper, Bob, and Weave," composer Rapson and trumpeter Bobby Bradford blur the lines between soloist and writer as Bradford flits in and around an irregular, pulsing piece based on an improvised snippet of Braxton's. On "Shaking the Dreams from a Bedspread," tuba player Bill Roper and drummer Alex Cline play along with the taped duets as if they were live, disguising the line between spontaneous and fixed elements. On "Better Than Truth, Bigger Than Life," bits and pieces of the live quintet and the taped duet are combined into totally new relationships on tape. Despite the technological twists, the results are not mechanical but fluid, lively, and unfailingly moving. In the end, it's hard to say whether the music belongs more to Braxton, Rapson, engineer Wayne Peet, or the quintet who play the scores. And that may be the point.

-- Ed Hazell