Fragments Of A Year (ECM B0019401-02)

Released in 2013, this two-disc set is a welcome addition to ECM’s obscure constellation of compilations, not least because it draws generously from the label’s New Series imprint. Such recordings are often omitted when anthologies favor the jazz-oriented catalogue. Here, written music and improvisation pass into one another with scarcely a seam. A year appears through fragments, each marking a different nuance of time. My delight is immediate when the sequence opens with “Un Dia De Noviembre,” from classical guitarist Zsófia Boros’s En otra parte (ECM New Series 2328). Leo Brouwer’s composition sets a high standard of narrative mastery. Boros retrieves each phrase from an interior country whose borders recede whenever touched. Her instrument speaks with the lucid privacy of handwriting found in an abandoned room. Stefano Scodanibbio’s music follows through Reinventions (ECM New Series 2072), offering his arrangement of “Bésame mucho,” which he considered the most beautiful song ever…