Ergo is a minimal, electro-acoustic ensemble, who mine areas of sound unique in modern jazz. If Not Inertia, their 2012 release on Cuneiform Records, uses live sampling of the ensemble, cresting and colliding in slowly enveloping improvisations, pushing the music in new directions, at once organic, intangible and subtly stunning.
Trombonist, computer musician Brett Sroka and drummer Shawn Baltazor are hold-overs for this third recording, with the addition of Sam Harris on piano, prepared piano and Rhodes, and for the first time guest musicians, both of them guitarists. Acclaimed avant-garde guitarist Mary Halvorson appears on much of the record and Sebastian Krueger of the indie band Inlets plays acoustic guitar on the final track.
listen to If Not Inertia featured on
WYNC's New Sounds with John Schaefer
"Ergo, the tight-knit trio of trombonist Brett Sroka, pianist [Sam Harris] and drummer Shawn Baltazor, continues to hone its patient, subtly enveloping ambient-jazz stylings on a new Cuneiform effort, If Not Inertia. The disc finds the band achieving a rare collectivity, in which no one voice dominates."
- Time Out, New York
"...has a deft touch when it comes to molding silence and drones into rich celestial balladry... a nifty confluence of George Lewis's dreamscapes and Miles's Lonely Fire, and while it's a record that invites you to watch the embers glow, it does its fair share of shooting off sparks."
- The Village Voice
"...into completely new horizons similar to nothing you've heard before... captivating, hypnotic, and attractively exotic music" - All Music Guide buy from Cuneiform Records
For booking and other inquiries, contact Brett Sroka at ergo @ ergoisaband . com
For press inquiries contact
joyce @ cuneiformrecords . com
For radio inquiries contact
radio @ cuneiformrecords . com