Fire Orchestra – Words (CD)

Gothenburg's Fire Orchestra operates at the outer edge of large-ensemble free jazz, where conductor Mats Gustafsson marshals upwards of two dozen musicians into something that feels less like a recording and more like a collective event. Rooted in the Swedish free-music underground that has long punched far above its international recognition, the group treats the orchestra itself as an improvising organism, blurring any clean line between composition and spontaneous discovery.