Pedway | "Vitalic"

Pedway is a freely improvising alto saxophone, bass, and drums trio featuring Caroline Davis, Matthew Golombisky, and Quin Kirchner. Born in Chicago in 2006 out of a collective love of creating new music in the moment, Pedway explores grooves, varying time signatures, and tonalities completely improvised, but always striving to create a song/tune-like aurora of the piece. Often one or two members start playing while the others follow suit, all while serving the direction of the music.

Caroline, Matthew, and Quin have a long history of playing with one another in various groups, such as Golombisky’s large chamber ensemble, Tomorrow Music Orchestra, electric “punk jazz” collaborative, Zing!, and various ensembles in Chicago. 

The stage was set when Matthew moved to New Orleans after finishing his undergraduate in North Carolina. There, in 2001, he met Quin and the two became inseparable, forming several groups of original music and exploring new ideas, including their freely improvised quartet, QMRplus (who played a week’s worth of shows in Chicago just a few weeks before Hurricane Katrina). After Katrina struck New Orleans in 2005, both decided to complete studies elsewhere. Matthew transferred to Northwestern in Chicago, finishing a Masters Degree in Composition, and Quin headed to Manhattan School of Music. During Matthew’s time at Northwestern, though studying “classical music composition”, he was curious about what the jazz program was like and spied on the Friday afternoon jam session. The cats were great, but one person that immediately caught his ear and had him saying, “I have GOT to play with her!” was Caroline Davis’ playing. He approached Caroline after the session and they learned they had a similar love of the free/improvised music scene in Chicago, mentioning Tim Daisy, Ken Vandermark,  and Dave Rempis. Caroline and Matthew immediately began playing in a couple of ensembles together. 

When Quin returned to his hometown of Chicago, more specifically Oak Park, the three started playing in Tomorrow Music Orchestra and Zing!. Later in 2006, they decided to start a brand new project that didn’t require charts, rehearsals, or limitations on what could enter the stage at any given moment. Pedway was born. 

Pedway released an EP, Jar Cell Dirge in 2006; a full-length album, recorded live, Subventure in 2008; and a studio album Passion Ball in 2013. This current record, Vitalic, is set to be released November 2nd, 2021 in digital and vinyl formats. Recorded live in Chicago in two prominent venues in 2017 (The Whistler and Cafe Mustache), the improvised pieces on the album blend their lively raucous sounds, alongside melodic sways and pop-like repeating chordal patterns. Chicago’s live-music recording icon, Dave Zuchowski (Ken Vandermark, Tim Daisy, Dave Rempis, Carol Genetti, Nick Mazzarella), recorded Vitalic with studio-like quality.