Derek Bailey & Cyro Baptista - Cyro 2xLP

Honest Jon's Records present a reissue of Derek Bailey and Cyro Baptista's Cyro, originally released on Incus in 1988. When Cyro Baptista moved to New York in 1980 from his home city of São Paulo, he brought with him an arsenal of percussion instruments, including the cuica (friction drum), surdo (the booming bass drum associated with samba), berimbau (single-string bow with resonating gourd), and cabasas galore, in the next few years deploying them most notably in numerous ensembles curated by John Zorn, who helped set up this studio session in 1982. As you might expect from someone whose infectious grooves have graced the work of Herbie Hancock, Astrud Gilberto, and Cassandra Wilson, Baptista expertly fires off cunning polyrhythms, even traces of thumping samba, with restless fluency. Bailey, the wily old fox, skirts and eschews the bait, which is quickly conjured away and newly fashioned. The guitarist homes in on the delicious squeaks of the cuica and the twanging drones of the ber