STILLNESS
by Sixth Sense
Karlton Hester, Stephen Nachmanovitch and Stephanie Phillips

$12.00

Music, like many aspects of actuality (especially the intangibles), art often defies the capacity of words to contain them. Thus music’s power and efficacy seems to reside far beyond the capacity of language but still has a measurable effect on our spirits during both its process of transmission and reception.

Review in The Strad: Collective improv trio Sixth Sense may be an occasional ensemble, but the players’ mutual understanding is finely tuned, resulting in an expressive spontaneity that survives the odd longueur. Most obviously, the musicians read each other’s phrasing beautifully, dovetailing or pausing together in respite as seems required. The most powerful moments, perhaps surprisingly considering the rather roomy acoustic, involve all three instruments squashed into a narrow upper range but, rather than stifling each other, finding a crevice in which to create melodic dissonance.