Bridget Ferrill & Áslaug Magnúsdóttir’s EP revels in the joy of complexity. A first collaborative release from the long-distance duo, Woodwind Quintet is an exercise in contrasts that quivers with electric pulses and patches. They crack, split, and weave through intricately embroidered classical elements in intimate and unexpected arrangements. Sonic fragments and scrambled instrumentation are disrupted by signal noise and rapid tempo shifts. Illogical compositions lead the listener along a dynamic meditation on beauty in alienation.

US-born Ferrill first met Icelandic Magnúsdóttir in Reykjavík in 2014. Originally from New Hampshire (by way of Rhode Island), the composer, synth-builder and engineer spent a few years living on-and-off in the breathtaking isolation of the Nordic country before settling in Berlin. Meanwhile, Magnúsdóttir is perhaps best-known for her work with ambient folk trio Samaris. Now living in Copenhagen, her focus on creating different experiences on traditional forms extends beyond performing music outside of conventional spaces but approaching instruments as sculptures. The two artists reconnected in 2018 on a serendipitous train ride after parallel tours of Oslo, Norway, and have been working together ever since.

Applying an irreverent approach to their shared academic backgrounds, Ferrill and Magnúsdóttir realised their first collaboration in the musty, damp interior of an empty water tank only accessible through a small opening. The metallic reverb and stormy dissonance of their “Silkworm + Sluxzxx” performance debuted as part of Seyðisfjörður’s LungA residency in 2019, with both artists pacing the dirt floor of the enormous cylindrical structure, a supernal vocal sample pushing against the noisy tumult.

For Woodwind Quintet, there’s more clarity, if as much interference with its equal parts discordant and melodious tangle of guitar pedals, YouTube clips and Ableton presets, modular synths and MIDI patches. There’s the digital string hardware instrument called the Karper, made by synth designer Peter Blasser, and samples from friend and colleague Liam Byrne’s viola da gamba. The harp, banjo and often-heavily processed vocals are the artists’ own, most likely recorded in Ferrill’s tiny apartment in south-east Berlin during one Magnúsdóttir’s regular visits.

Interested in taking traditional material and deconstructing its form, Ferrill and Magnúsdóttir dabble in interruption and structure with a chaotic but always intentional and precise method. “We cared a lot about timing,” explains Ferrill. “Getting all the sounds perfectly puzzled together.”
The opening strings of “Gossip” are scrambled, scratched, and broken apart before being brought back into harmony by delicate piano keys. “Eternal Liquid Sad” expresses a powerful feeling of melancholy with humour, as its leading legato is sped up, jumbled, and reversed through an undertow of deep bass. It’s a sense of subtle enormity that carries into the gloomier, low-pitched orchestration of “Tapestry”, as a kick and syncopated hi-hat occasionally harries alongside.

As if to foreground these sonic punchlines, the astonishingly beautiful cover image—photographed by Byrne with a hacked digital camera—is a modern take on an old still life. A zither ruined by concrete is submerged in a tepid pool of bathwater, in what could be either a baptism or a drowning of an ancient instrument in a present-day tub.