LINER NOTES by Andy Hamilton

This album represents the first time that the Italian duo of vibraphonist Sergio Armaroli and pianist Francesca Gemmo have joined forces with the renowned London-born bassist Barry Guy. The Italian pair first recorded together as far back as 2017 when they recorded the album Luc Ferrari Exercises D'Improvisation in a quartet. More relevant here is that they also recorded together in another quartet on the album Prismo (ezz-thetics, 2020) which was released under Armaroli's name.

The album At Sotto II Mare is jointly credited to all three players and the album's twelve tracks are all jointly credited to all three, a tell-tale sign that the album's music was freely improvised. Although it is immediately clear that the music was improvised, at times it sounds as if it could have been scored, so tight are the three players that they fit together like pieces of a jigsaw, with no one leading the way but all of them following the collective path. With the piano and vibraphone following similar paths, it is easy to call up memories of John Lewis' piano and Milt Jackson's vibes in Modern Jazz Quartet, with Barry Guy filling Percy Heath's role on bass. The album's forty-eight improvised minutes are enthralling throughout, with all three players deserving praise and credit. Simply beautiful.

Deep hinterlands distinguish the three protagonists on this exceptionally simpatico date and imbue it with a sharpened sense of purpose. You might call it freely improvised, but as the liner notes reveal, unplanned might be a better descriptor. Italian vibraphonist Sergio Armaroli, who seems to be the principal mover, reportedly gave short verbal instructions before the music began. And while his exact words are not provided, they may account for the cohesion of what follows. Or perhaps not. Practiced improvisers, as assuredly all three are, can prove quite capable of orchestrating on-the-fly without anyone's say so.

That is certainly the case with storied bassist Barry Guy who resides at the heart of this session. Armaroli too, who describes himself as a composer, percussionist, vibraphonist, teacher and total artist. While rooted in jazz and experimental music, his trajectory includes keen engagement with contemporary classical forms, particularly the legacy of John Cage. He shares that interest with countrywoman pianist Francesca Gemmo, who has recorded extensively from Cage's repertoire, and has collaborated with Armaroli since 2017.

Indeed they utilize recurrent motifs, often an indicator of intent, only sparingly. Gemmo's tolling figures in the opening track, "Prelude," evoke church bells heard through a fractured lens, surfacing between sudden spasms of atonal counterpoint. Armaroli's metallic punctuations in "At Sotto Il Mare—Second Movement" suggest found percussion as much as vibraphone, anchoring a piece that resists rhythmic certainty.

Across the album's twelve tracks—comprising six trios, three duos, and three solos—emphasis shifts fluidly between density and space. Some pieces resemble sonic mosaics where splashes of adjacent color create emergent wholes. Others spiral into layers of hectic overlapping lines, as if each performer were exploring divergent routes within a common perimeter.

The solo tracks highlight the trio's range and individual vocabularies. " Interlude Between III. Double Bass Solo" confirms Guy's mastery of contrast, zigzagging between dense bottom end sawing and razor sharp filigree heights, before toggling to scuffed abrasions, flinty picks and resonant buzz. It's an object lesson in extended technique and structural pacing. Armaroli's "Interlude Between I.; Vibraphone Solo" unfolds like a recursive tone row, flexibly phrased, with his dampened reverberations suggesting the influence of the great Walt Dickerson. Gemmo's "Interlude Between II. Piano Solo" possesses a similarly elastic gait, juxtaposing light and shade, until a series of tonally centered chords hints at resolution, only to be dismissed by a final flurry.

Despite its abstraction, the album is not austere. It invites close listening without demanding allegiance to melody or meter. Each gesture, while ephemeral, is focused. The players operate with antennae attuned to sound placement and temporal tension, maintaining intensity without resorting to dramatics. The record offers no grand statement, but in its restraint and precision, it articulates something more elusive: a mutual aesthetic language spoken in fragments and echoes.