Q.E.D. (or opus 54, for
Rypdal archivists) is a composition in five movements for electric guitar, string ensemble, and woodwinds, and in it
Rypdal often alternates sections of great dissonance with near silence, or lonely sustained notes by just one or two instruments. It can have the sweeping starkness of a tracking shot over a fjord, but there's a certain coldness to it as well, and even confirmed fans of his jazz work may take a while to warm up to it. The second movement, with its needling backwards guitar over the string ensemble, is at times reminiscent of Red-era Frippertronics; the most dramatic and broodingly gorgeous playing arises in the fourth movement, though, with
Rypdal's aching solos over ominous near-subsonic rumbling. ~ Paul Collins