The Way Appears is a CD by cellist duo Leah Plave and India Gailey. It consists of seven commissioned pieces by young(ish) Canadian composers who were asked to create pieces in which the two instruments function as equal partners rather than, say, as soloist and continuo. It’s a really varied and interesting collection providing a little over forty minutes of music.

Right up front there’s an interesting contrast between Emily Kennedy’s conversational but rather busy Triptych and Adam Vincent Clarke’s Voix Lointaines which is much more elegiac with some vocalisation thrown in.

The title track, by Kelly Marie-Murphy, is the longest piece on the disk and is basically in three parts. It starts fast, almost frantic, with scoops and repeated figures before seguing into a slower conversation with repeated fragments; bowed on one instrument, pizzicato on the other before reverting to the faster style with both instruments bowed.

silhouette, mirror by Leilehua Lanzilotti might be the most “out there” of the seven pieces. It starts out slow and evocative, abstract but tactile but then it gets weirder with the cellos rumbling, squeaking and echoing each other. And that’s a real contrast with Matthias McIntire’s Islands which is lush and lyrical with no weird effects at all!

Surfacing, by Jeff Reilly, is superficially quite simple; built up of simple figures radiating out to produce some quite long riffs which are actually quite hypnotic. The record concludes with my favourite piece, The Bee and Her Wildflower by Cree composer Cris Derksen, who died in a traffic accident just before the recording was completed. It starts as a sort of upbeat pastoral celebrating pollination that gets livelier and almost dance like. It’s definitely a “happy” piece.

The recording was made at Trinity-St. Stephen’s United Church, Nemcheboogwek, Mi’kma’ki / Amherst, Nova Scotia in April 2026 and it’s very transparent and detailed with a very solid soundstage. It’s being released as a physical CD and in lossless digital at up to 96kHz/24bit quality, which is what I listened to. It will also be available on streaming platforms including in Dolby ATMOS. There’s a booklet with excellent notes. Release date is October 30th, 2026.

Catalogue information: Redshift Records TK595