Rent Romus is a big picture kind of guy. Over the past quarter century he’s been a catalytic figure on the San Francisco Bay Area’s improv music scene as a player, producer, and proprietor of the invaluable Edgetone Records, a label responsible for nearly 200 releases by a daunting array of brilliant envelope-pushing artists. As a composer and bandleader, he’s pursued a similarly expansive vision with his Life’s Blood Ensemble, a talent-laden group for which he’s created a strikingly vivid body of music (often inspired by epic mythology drawn from his ancestral roots in Finnish culture).

For Rising Colossus, Romus brings his various musical worlds together. Focusing on original pieces he’s commissioned from younger Bay Area artists, Rising Colossus offers an incisive and often exhilarating glimpse at a scene that Romus has played an essential role in shaping. The LBE dives headlong into a disparate array of compositions, opening and closing the album with very different works inspired by epic tales.
- liner notes excerpt by Andrew Gilbert, San Francisco Chronicle and Bay Area News Group

Timothy Orr- drums, percussion
Rent Romus - alto saxophone, flute
Joshua Marshall - tenor saxophone
Heikki "Mike" Kosikinen - e-trumpet, tenor recorder
Mark Clifford - vibes
Safa Shokrai - double bass
Max Judelson - double bass



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"In the concept reminiscent of Ornette Coleman's "Chapaca Suite"".
- A Challenge to Fate

"It is an understatement to say that there are no dull moments on Rising Colossus. The dramatic music alternates worked-out sections with intense improvising, is consistently unpredictable, explores many moods and emotions, and always has the potential to become explosive."
- Scott Yanow, L.A. Jazz Scene

"Alto saxophonist, I've become a big fan of his work in recent years. Here he goes big, with a septet that sounds larger still, doing pieces "he's commissioned from younger Bay Area artists," fellow altoists John Tchicai and Anthony Braxton, plus one original. Hits a couple nubs that gave me pause, but ultimately they power through everything."
-Tom Hull

"Indeed, Romus and associates have reached a milestone with this top-notch outing that defies strict categorizations when considering bridges between free improvisation and modern progressive jazz. It's a seamless incorporation of the best of many worlds."
- Glenn Astarita, All About Jazz