Reuben Radding's "Intersections"

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Pine Ear Music has released Intersections, the debut leader recording by New York City bassist/composer Reuben Radding, with his new trio featuring Matt Moran on vibraphone, and Oscar Noriega on clarinet. As the title of the CD suggests, diverse paths, both musical and personal, find their meeting point in Radding's atonal, counterpoint-driven, compositions. The album concludes with a triumphant reworking of the “Dance of Fury” from Oliver Messiaen's landmark chamber work “Quartet For The End Of Time.” The group will be celebrating the CD release at Barbes in Brooklyn, NY on December 28th.

“I'm nuts about Jimmy Giuffre, and his drummerless trios, ” Radding admits. “I had played in a group in Seattle called Vena Cava, which also included vibes, but it was a little more large-scale. I wanted the spare feeling of the Giuffre 3 with Paul Bley and Steve Swallow, that sense of space.” Returning to New York in 2002 after 5 years on the West Coast, Radding began writing the tunes that would become Intersections. “I was inspired by my friend the Seattle saxophonist Greg Sinibaldi to reinvestigate the 12-tone method of composition, which I had studied years ago, and to see if I could use it to improvise, ” Radding says. I began writing tunes using the rows I had come up with and they evoked moods to me, memories of places I'd lived or spent important times. Canal & Lafayette for instance, was a place I lived back in the early 90's for a brief period right after I quit my day job. I moved in only to find my roomates were dangerously crazy, and the scene on the street was crazy too. An intense time!” Radding found perfect partners in Matt Moran, known for his work in John Hollenbeck's Claudia Quintet, and the group Sideshow, and Oscar Noriega, the sensitive reed man best known from recordings with Satoko Fuji, his own Play Party on Omnitone, and many other forward-thinking groups. Radding engineered and mixed the recording himself at Studio STATS, his Brooklyn facility where he has also recorded recent sides for Stephen Gauci, Tony Malaby, Michael Bisio, and even Roubai3 from Lebanon.

This is the first time Radding's own compositions have been recorded, despite performing original improvisations on numerous recordings as a bassist, including 2003's Luminescence with reed master Daniel Carter on AUM Fidelity, and 2005's The Branch Will Not Break, with Carrie Shull and Tara Flandreau on Umbrella Recordings. Radding's only previous release as a leader was the 1996 Sun Ra tribute CD Love In Outer Space, credited to the band Myth Science, on the Knitting Factory label. The striking mysterious photography that graces the cover of Intersections is a multiple exposure “Sea of Snakes, ” by Brooklyn photographer Susan Bowen. Pine Ear Music is distributed by North Country.

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