elcome to Archive 04, “Smoke, Airs”. This issue features incredible music by an outstanding collection of artists who, as Eric Wubbels writes, “work primarily in and between traditions where the coexistence of improvisation and composition within a musical form is not radical, but assumed.” Archive 04 includes articles by Wubbels and Alice Teyssier, and our first edition of “Archive Concerts”: audio/video releases of full programs from Wet Ink’s history, complete with commentary from the composers and notes on curation. Archive 04 also celebrates Wet Ink’s latest record release, "Smoke, Airs". Out September 25th on Huddersfield Contemporary Records, “Smoke, Airs” is the end product of a multi-year collaboration between Wet Ink, Charmaine Lee, UK-based composers P.A. Tremblay, Bryn Harrison, and Kristina Wolfe, and the University of Huddersfield.

In Echoes of Echoes, multitalented flutist/vocalist/scholar Alice Teyssier offers a nuanced and personal look "under the hood” of an ambitious three-year project centered around the 2019 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (hcmf//). Teyssier, who joined Wet Ink as guest flutist for workshops, performances at hcmf//, and the studio recording of these four new works by Charmaine Lee, P.A. Tremblay, Bryn Harrison, and Kristina Wolfe, shares musical analysis gleaned from interviews with the composers, while offering ruminations on how changing circumstances - both expected and extraordinary - affect our perception of time, musically and otherwise. 

In Listening Towards Openness, Wet Ink co-director Eric Wubbels has compiled a wonderfully in-depth resource for curious listeners (or “friendly experiencers”, in the parlance of Anthony Braxton). Wubbels shares his incisive take on the work of seven vital artists whose work occupies an “intermediary, hybrid space” along the continuum of notation and improvisation. Featuring music by influential figures such as Braxton and Eliane Radigue alongside innovative voices including Luke Stewart, Kaja Draksler, and more, Wubbels’s list is a must-read and a must-listen for new music lovers.

For our first edition of “Archive Concerts”, we are pleased to share documentation from our June 2018 season finale. This concert featured the premieres of works by Ingrid Laubrock, Darius Jones, Charmaine Lee, and Lea Bertucci, performed by a large ensemble comprised of the composers alongside Peter Evans (trumpet), Weston Olencki (trombone), and the Wet Ink septet. This was also Wet Ink’s first performance of Peter Ablinger’s remarkable graphic score, Black Series. Putting this concert together with these singular artists was a very special experience, as Wet Ink co-director Sam Pluta eloquently sums up in his introductory remarks: “The joys of dialog and collaboration bore joys of listening, created friendships, enacted future dialogs, and hopefully, in a small way, pushed the horizon of future realities.”