Monte Espina + Liz Tonne + Louise Fristensky - pueblo gl​ó​rtha | CD

Collaboration has always been at the very core of Monte Espina’s activities. Since forming in 2016, the North Texas-based electroacoustic free improvisation duo of Ernesto Montiel and Miguel Espinel have collaborated with countless local and touring musicians both in live performance and at their weekly “training” sessions.

Given their shared interests in exploratory composition and improvisation, and mutual ties to the music program at the University of North Texas, Louise Fristensky has become the duo’s most frequent collaborator. Fristensky’s multi-instrumental approach that “seeks out waves of timbral matching and clouds of contrast” has been an ideal fit for expanding Monte Espina’s sinuous sound environments into exciting new dimensions.

It was through a serendipitous, concert-filled weekend trip to Austin, Texas in 2017 that connected Liz Tonne into the Monte Espina orbit. While it was Diamanda Galás’s powerful voice that brought Montiel and his partner to Austin, it was Tonne’s vocal performance with Chris Cogburn, Mike Bullock, and Linda Aubrey at a gallery space that left a lasting impression. “I’d never heard of her before and her vocal work left me astonished,” writes Montiel. “I later learned that she played an active role in the early 2000s Boston improvised scene...  more

credits

released November 30, 2021

Liz Tonne - voice
Louise Fristensky - voice, kazoo, flute, bells, objects
Ernesto Montiel - objects on guitar
Miguel Espinel - percussion, cymbals, objects, autoharp, live processing

Recorded by Justin Lemons at Infinite Ohm Studio in Denton, Texas on May 19, 2019
Mastered by Andrew Weathers

Paintings by Bernardo Bermudez
Images edited by Ginger Berry and Juan Pablo Garza
(from the book BAB by Anna Maria Ferris, Caracas, 1998)
Layout by Matt Irwin and Ernesto Montiel