Cicada Woods is a fairly recently formed Toronto based group consisting of Suhashini Arulanandam – violin, Esme Allen-Creighton – viola, Sybil Shanahan – cello and Shannon Wojewoda – double bass. Their first recording titled Seasons is of two works based on the four seasons. The first is an arrangement of Astor Piazolla’s Las Cuatro Estaciones Porteñas (The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires). This was originally scored for bandonéon, violin, electric guitar, piano, and double bass and the arrangement aims to match Piazolla’s sound world as much as possible through the use of extended technique etc. Of course this four movement piece is tango based and that comes over clearly in the arrangement and I think the four acoustic instruments manage to sound like a tango ensemble. There are some particularly effective percussive effects for example in the third movement “Primavera”.

The second piece is a new work by Robert Carli called The Four Seasons of Toronto and it’s in two movements. The first movement “Spring/Summer” is a very busy piece based around a kind of minimalism with lots of momentum coming from driving rhythms. “Autumn/Winter” is much gentler; quieter and more meditative. The two halves contrast nicely.

Cicada are clearly skilled musicians and they are very well recorded here. It’s a digital only release and the high resolution version of the recording (48kHz/24bit) is clear and detailed with the instruments sounding very natural. All in all it’s a very pleasant and interesting release.

Catalogue information: It’s a self release available through Bandcamp.