Golfam Khayam, Mona Matbou Riahi

Narrante is the ECM debut of guitarist Golfam Khayam and clarinettist Mona Matbou Riahi, who perform together as the Naqsh Duo. Both were born in Tehran and continued their studies abroad after the conservatory there. Their nine jointly written pieces take the forms, modes, drones and rhythms of Persian music, and its call for improvisation, into a contemporary chamber setting. The result belongs neither to Iranian tradition nor to Western new music alone.

The album was recorded in July 2015 at the Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI in Lugano, in collaboration with the Swiss radio station RSI Rete Due. Manfred Eicher and Ramin Sadighi produced it, and Stefano Amerio was the engineer. According to ECM Reviews, Eicher already knew earlier tapes by the two musicians before he invited them to record. The cover reproduces a painting by Pariyoush Ganji. Every title is an Italian musical term, from Arioso and Parlando to Lamento - Furioso.

The opening Testamento begins with Riahi sounding two instruments at once, one of them a half-clarinet used as a drone. Khayam's guitar then enters with an Andalusian-sounding melody beneath long clarinet phrases. Battaglia, the longest track at nearly ten minutes, moves furthest into contemporary classical territory, with Khayam striking the body and strings of her guitar with hands and mallets. Elsewhere the clarinet turns to buzzes, trills and sudden dynamic swings, and the silences between phrases carry as much weight as the notes. The closing Lamento - Furioso finds the duo, as ECM Reviews put it, "at its freest, raw and rich with ideas".

Reviewing the album for Jazzwise, Robert Shore wrote that guitar and clarinet reflect one another and "seem to vibrate in sympathy" between the silences. Gary Whitehouse of Green Man Review called Narrante "an utterly fascinating album", placing it where Western and Eastern traditions meet. He also praised ECM's spacious recorded sound. On WDR, Thomas Daun heard the fine ornamentation, microtonal colours and intricate rhythms of Iranian tradition set in a new context. Fono Forum recommended the record to listeners who think they have heard everything.

This is the CD edition, ECM 2475, first released on 20 May 2016.