For those unaware, Under the Surface is a suite of seven pieces, inspired by the roots of trees and how they work together as underground systems to support the survival of all trees, even outside of their own species.

This complex system is called the wood wide web, or the mycorrhizal network. I think of this as a metaphor from nature about community - turning the notion of survival of the fittest on its head - to mean that the strong reach out to help the weak and the damaged, fostering a collective cooperation that supports the whole.

In other words, humans need each other and must work together to survive and thrive, just like trees. Under the Surface has been made possible with support from Chamber Music America’s New Jazz Works program funded through the generosity of the Doris Duke Foundation.

1. Points of Departure [6:30]
2. Savour [8:56]
3. Interval Haiku [10:56]
4. Tear Bright [7:04]
5. Mother Tongue [08:07]
6. For Stanley [8:39]
7. Under the Surface [7:47]

Up first on the Alchemy Sound Project performs the music of Sumi Tonooka - itself an energetically sculpted, munificently impassioned new recording - is the fervently charged, drum-fed masterpiece Points of Departure and that is backed by the Charlie brown-esque sounds of Savour, the bountifully rhythmic Interval Haiku, a soulful yearn that threads throughout the languishing Tear Bright, the set rounding out on the emboldened Mother Tongue and the luxuriant For Stanley, closing on the resplendently organic sounds of the titular Under the Surface.

www.alchemysoundproject.com