Comprised of members from Chicago, Indiana, and North Carolina, the Unstable Ensemble combines contemporary classical with avantgarde jazz. Drawing upon the greats -- Schoenberg, Crumb – the group successfully creates beautiful textures and moods out of abstract melodies and noises, ranging from dark to poignant to playful. The vocabulary is largely from the jazz world, but the overall effect is very much in line with atonal and improvised new music. 4, 7, 9, 1.

1. baritone sounds, then jazz guitar solo. sparse, mysterious.
2. percussion pitterpatter with random noises and brass moans, then enter short plaintive melodic fragments from sax.
3. mostly random percussion sounds interspersed with blips.
4. quiet til 0:30. sparse, moody sax on top of gorgeous low rumble. some instrument on phaser (~didjeridoo). ends with static noises.
5. jazz guitar solo + wandering sax scales/mouthpiece noises. gets intense and then ends with a schoenberg-esque abstract sadness.
6. percussion/guitar noises + melodic blips from sax throughout.
7. latin guitar melody + sax solo throughout. the most tonal track so far, quite pretty in the last minute or so.
8. blips + noises, then guitar solo, then ends w/ beautiful dark texture.
9. slow baritone + sad sax/guitar melodies. high freq sine waves. midway, big buildup of mouthpiece warbles. ends with steady jazz beat and melodic fragments.