A group improvisation by the Tone Road Ramblers

This is a long-awaited opportunity for me to write about the Tone Road Ramblers when readers can experience one of their improvisations without it being just through the abstraction of prose. The video comes to us with thanks to Eric Mandat. It can also be seen on YouTube.

Morgan Powell

As currently constituted, the personnel of the Tone Road Ramblers are: Morgan Powell and James Staley, trombones, and Ray Sasaki, trumpet. These three are original members who have played together since the collective's founding in 1981. Eric Mandat, the clarinetist and odd-hand percussionist, came in 1989, and although Howie Smith, with his bouquet of saxophone voices (ranging from soprano to contra-bass) has been with the group in one form or another for years, he officially replaced flutist John

Ray Sasaki

Fonville a few years ago. Only recently have they been without a formal percussionist, and they think that's okay. By nature, the best improvisers are firmly rooted realists, not needing magic to pull gold from straw. For them, there is no important difference between them anyway. If you listen, you will understand where and how these distinctions dissolve.