Improvisation and collaboration have shaped the voice of the Mivos Quartet, always searching for new influences and inspiration outside of the traditional composer-performer relationship. In this concert, the American string quartet presents works that blur the line between composition and improvisation, written by saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire and composer/trumpeter Jalalu-Kalvert Nelson.
Ingrid Laubrock’s Ashes is an explosive response to war and the devastation that it brings, inspired by a letter that her father sent to Vladimir Putin begging him to end the war in Ukraine. In May Our Centers Hold, Ambrose Akinmusire incorporates specific intervals and chords, overlapping harmonies, repeated motives and melodic lines that can be interpreted with great freedom by the quartet in the moment. Jalalu Kalvert-Nelson’s Speakings/Bent Out of Shape is full of abrupt changes and different moods: nothing works for long and there is always a change or breakdown of some kind.
