Last year I reviewed a CD of improvisations by the American cellist Frances­Marie Uitti and‚ using electroacoustic equipment‚ the composer Jonathan Harvey (Sargasso‚ 2/01). Much of Harvey’s ‘written­down’ music for cello was made with Uitti in mind‚ and two of the pieces in this recital likewise incorporate electroacoustic elements. Here it is not Uitti‚ however‚ but a young French­based cellist who has gathered these five works together. Though the pieces happen to be presented in chronological order‚ the programme also has a musical (and palindromic) logic about it. At the extremes‚ Curve with Plateaux and Advaya are the most extended pieces here‚ Curve exploiting the monophonic‚ linear possibilities of the instrument‚ with particular emphasis on the extreme high register. The brief Ricercare una melodia and Chant are even more explicit in exploring a songlike idiom‚ and the Three Sketches each take as their point of departure a different de­tuning (or scordatura) of the instrument. The shorter pieces share a quasi­improvised‚ spontaneous feel. But the most ‘finished’ and‚ to my mind‚ involving pieces here are those that blend acoustic and electroacoustic sounds. Ricercare una melodia weaves real­time delays of various sorts (including slowed­down playback) into a satisfying‚ quasi­canonic polyphony at times reminiscent of viols. Altogether more ambitious (and lasting over 20 minutes) is Advaya‚ in which the electronic sounds do more than simply follow the cello’s lead. In fact‚ they have such character as to suggest an alternative‚ composite persona‚ just as capable of taking on the cello as of complementing it. At times it manages to do both at once (as around the 15­minute mark‚ which recalls some of the climaxes in the disc of improvised music I referred to earlier). Advaya brings together many strands of Harvey’s personality in a striking manner; for this piece alone‚ the CD is worth having. Benjamin Carat acquits himself very handsomely of the considerable demands made of him throughout. As to the sound recording‚ I found it a touch prosaic in the acoustic pieces‚ but in the Ricercare and Advaya it combines the disparate elements very effectively.