INTAKT RECORDS – CD-REVIEWS
LOTTE ANKER - SYLVIE COURVOISER - IKUE MORIR
Alien Huddle

 

Tre av frijazzens modigste kvinner har satt hverandre stevne og gir oss musikk ingen andre er i nærheten av.

Den danske saksofonisten Lotte Anker, den sveitsisk-amerikanske pianisten Sylvie Courvoisier og den japansk-amerikanske ”elektronikeren” Ikue Mori besøkte Moldejazz for to år siden. Der tok de oss med på ei reise ingen andre kunne ha invitert til og slik låter det også på ”Alien Huddle”, spilt inn i studio i New York litt seinere det samme året.
Anker, Courvoisier og Mori har etter hvert lang fartstid innen dette åpne og luftige uttrykket. Anker har studert og er bosatt i hjemlandet, mens de to andre har slått seg ned i New York for mange år siden. De er begge viktige deler av down town-miljøet med bl.a. John Zorn som en slags ledestjerne.
De 11 kollektivt unnfanga låtene befinner seg i både frijazz- og i samtidsmusikklandskapet. Det er sjølsagt ganske så grenseløs musikk der evnen til å lytte er usedvanlig viktig. De tre er langt framskredne i den kunsten og de responderer umiddelbart på innspillene som kommer uten stans.
Musikken på ”Alien Huddle” er krevende både for de som skaper den og for de som skal ta i mot den. For de som vil ha noe et godt stykke utenfor A4-musikken derimot er det masse spennende lydlandskap og originale måter å kommunisere på her som man ikke finner noe annet sted.

Tor Hammerø, Side 2, Norway, September 2, 2008

 

 

Des Pudels Kern enthält bei Alien Huddle (Intakt CD 144) neben den Mephistas SYLVIE COURVOISIER & IKUE MORI einen schrägen Vogel Federlos aus dem Norden. Die Saxophonistin LOTTE ANKER, Leaderin des Copenhagen Art Ensemble, kennt den schwesterlichen Verbund aus dem Trio mit Crispell & Mazur, gesellt sich aber auch zu den Boys in the Backroom, in Mokuto oder mit Taborn & Cleaver. Mit Berne & Rainey verwandelt sich das Nur-Frauen-Kleeblatt in Sonographic July, aber eigentlich sind Rock oder Hose nicht das Thema. Das Design mischt Himmelblau mit Pink, die 11 Klangbilder allumfassend elektroakustischen Krawall von Piano, das Courvoisier maximalistisch von innen und außen traktiert, polymorph-perversem Laptopgezwitscher und die Klangfarben von Soprano-, Alto- & Tenorsaxophon. Anker ist der luftige und zugleich singende oder krähende Pol, Courvoisier der feste, mit harten Klopflauten, gemeiselten eisig-kristallinen Splittern, klappernd verstreuten Perlen, drahtigem Geschepper. Und Mori ähnelt dem flüssigen Element, mit quecksilbrigen Spritzern, kullendem und rieselndem Getröpfel und gischtig sprudelnden Glitches. Dazu kommen vogelige Assoziationen, unruhiges Getrippel und Geflatter, aufgeregtes Tschilpen, Krächzen. Wobei die Schnäbel Sendboten des Wirrwars zu gehören scheinen, fremdartigen Loplops und Habakuks, Zwitschermaschinen in 'Wäldern‘, die jedem Exotismus spotten.
Rigobert Dittmann, Bad Alchemy, Deutschland, Oktober 2008

 


Heftig en luid, dreigend dan weer verstild en fluisterend, gracieus - elf miniaturen sprekend en beeldend geïmproviseerd in een alien kring van speelsters: saxofoniste Lotte Anker uit Kopenhagen, pianiste Sylvie Courvoisier en elektronisch percussioniste Ikue Mori uit de New Yorkse downtown-scene. Klanken uit alle delen van de piano, alle kieren van de saxofoon, alle uithoeken van de drummachine, klanken die een organische logica herbergen en met hun verdichtingen, texturen en dynamica tot de verbeelding spreken. Bijvoorbeeld in Whistling Swan. Zoals een vogel als díe vogel klinkt niet wetend dat zij zo klinkt: pas achteraf ontwarde de groep in haar muziek een ornithologische lijn en kwamen er titels als Ostrich War, Dancing Rooster Comp, Sparkling Sparrows bij. Anker’s saxofoonspel schakelt tussen polariteiten, tussen de ruig-heftige en de lyrisch-verstilde kant. Courvoisier (samen met Han Bennink en Wolfgang Puschnig dit jaar voor de Europese Jazzprijs genomineerd) wisselt de gewone externe toetsenklank continue af met de klanken van de string-piano: geplukte en gedempte snaren, harpachtige klanken, de klank van metaalkogels die tegen de balken tikken, geschetter van afgeplakte snaren en verweeft alles tot een dynamisch geheel. Mori, ooit in DNA begonnen, heeft op de drummachine haar eigen klanken-universum (regendruppels, insecten, krakend ijs, stuifzand, brandende kabels etc.) en geeft muziek een magisch-poëtische sfeer mee.
Henning Bolte, JAZZ #5/2008, The Nederlands


deutsche Übersetzung:

Heftig und laut, drohend und im nächsten Moment flüsternde Stille, graziös – elf Miniaturen
ausdrucksvoll improvisiert in einem Kreis von Ausserirdischen: Saxofonistin Lotte Anker aus Kopenhagen, Pianistin Sylvie Courvoisier und die elektronische Perkussionistin Ikue Mori aus der New Yorker Downtown-Szene. Klänge aus allen Teilen des Piano, allen Schlitzen und Öffnungen des Saxophons, aus allen Ecken und Enden der Drummaschine, Klänge, denen eine organische Logik innewohnt und die mit ihren Verdichtungen, Texturen und Dynamik das Vorstellungsvermögen aufblühen lässt. Zum Beispiel im Falle des Stücks Whistling Swan. Wie ein Vogel als eben der Vogel klingt und nicht weiss, dass er so klingt: erst im Nachhinein wurde sich die Gruppe des ornithologischen Gehalts gewahr und entstanden weitereTitel wie Ostrich War, Dancing Rooster Comp, Sparkling Sparrows. Ankers Saxofonspiel schaltet zwischen Polaritäten hin und her, zwischen der rauh-heftigen und der stillen lyrischen Seite. Courvoisier (zusammen mit Han Bennink und Wolfgang Puschnig dieses Jahr für den europäischen Jazzpreis nominiert) wechselt den externen Tastenklang fortlaufend mit den Klängen des Saitenpianos ab: gezupfte und gedämpfte Saiten, harfenähnliche Klänge, Metallkugeln, die gegen die hölzernen Balken im Inneren des Klaviers knallen, Gerassel van abgeklebten Saiten und bringt dies alles in einem dynamischen Ganzen zur Wirkung. Mori, ehemals in DNA gestartet, hat auf der Drummaschine ihr eigenes Klanguniversum entwickelt (Regentropfen, Insekten, knackendes Eis, Flugsand, brennende Kabel usw.) und verleiht der Musik eine magisch-poetische Atmosphäre.

Henning Bolte, JAZZ #5/2008, The Nederlands

 

Andreas Fellinger, Freistil, Österreich, Oktober 2008

 

Martin Gansinger, Jazzzeit, Österreich, September-Oktober 2008

 

Martin Schuster, Concerto, Österreich, Oktober/November 2008

 

 

It’s hard to define what makes for successful improvised music, for the most successful music in the genre—witness this CD-- creates fresh definitions for the terms of its success. We might begin to listen to this through the window of its title, with the suggestions of both the strange and the close encounter, and the track titles’ invocations of birds. It takes its title from sculptor Martin Puryear's “Alien Huddle,” a large wooden sculpture that consists of three parts: a large sphere, a much smaller hemisphere and a still smaller quarter of a sphere. The sculpture had impressed all three musicians when it was exhibited at MOMA and it’s easy to see how their own aesthetics would find resonance in its deftly crafted, unpainted wooden strips as well as the unfinished marks left by the staples used during its construction. Like Puryear’s sculpture, this music has three parts, but the relationships between scale and distance and significance keeps changing.
What one often hears here, though, is not the “huddle” but the almost quantifiable distance between the three musicians—a sense of spaciousness that’s apparent whether the music is relatively dense and brusque (“Woodpecker Peeks”) or eerily spacious (“Morning Dove”). While the sounds of birds arise often enough to sound deliberate, even without the consistently avian titles, they’re birds in odd spaces, at times, apparently singing in Mori’s electronics, at others singing just outside the imagined window of her laboratory.
While the trio of Anker’s saxophones (she plays soprano, alto and tenor here), Courvoisier’s often prepared piano and Mori’s electronics might seem unusual, the three immediately adapt certain practices that can suggest it’s the most normal grouping in the world. Mori plays a lot of electronic “percussion,” Just as Courvoisier plays a lot of acoustic percussion inside the piano, and it’s surprising how often this can sound like a sax, piano, drums trio, as in the almost straight-ahead free jazz of “Night Owl.” It can also be tense and relaxed, sometimes, oddly, at the same time, and it’s not unusual for the music to include both expressionist and non-expressionist positions simultaneously. Time gets divided up in fresh ways, sometimes between people who are listening to time as closely as they’re listening to their partners. “Dancing Rooster Comp,” for example, is a ragged field in which the players either directly echo or apparently ignore what’s happening around them.
While I’ve heard Courvoisier and Mori together in two groups previously (Courvoisier’s Lonelyville and the trio Mephista with Susie Ibarra), this particular grouping seems the most successful of the three, Anker’s linear clarity creating a special spaciousness for the two to explore.
Stuart Broomer, pointofdeparture, USA, October 2008

 

Kazue Yokoi Jazz Hohyo, Japan, Piano Trio 2007-2008 Special

 

Andy Hamilton, The Wire, London, November 2008

 

Henning Bolte, Jazzthetik, Deutschland, November 2008

 

 


There is something palpably happening in this program of improvisation which lends it distinction. In this trio of reeds, piano, and electronics it's not by any means the latter that is what might be called the rogue element. Instead the coalescence of the music as well as its frenetic moments provide its considerable substance. There's no doubt that this is music happening in real time, but the means by which it reaches that status are veiled, enticing in their very intangibility.
"Night Owl" perhaps best exemplifies this, not least because of the degree to which the music is shaded, impermissible of glare. The trio's momentum is governed by stealth and topped out by Anker's long tones on alto sax, while Courvoisier and Mori go to work on the details of trialogue, ensuring that any dogmatic quality the music might possess is the result of thought and contemplation.
Such rarefied realization is also a mark of "Dancing Rooster Comp," where an underlying motivation momentarily appears to be the undermining of tonality before the music enters a half-territory through which Cecil Taylor might previously have passed. Even if that is so, Sylvie Courvoisier's approach to the keyboard is less rhetorical by comparison, and she delights in reducing its tonality, working a minimal seam.
"Whistling Swan" strikes a different balance between acoustic and electric, with Anker's soprano sax vocabulary the opposite of expansionist in the face of Mori's sound threads, many seemingly conjured out of nothing save the air, and Courvoisier utilizing the piano's extended possibilities with the aim of undermining the silence in mind.
There's also music of expansive gesture here. Anker and Courvoisier engage in dialog as close to free jazz as anything here on "Crow and Raven." The feeling is rendered only more clearly when the following "Blackbird" emphasizes the alien of the disc's title. Music is again summoned up out of nothing, the passing moments marked in steps both faltering and purposeful at the same time. It's music worthy of deep listening, which is true of the entire program. Leaving the everyday, even as it rewards the effort of doing so, the profundity of the moment also reaches exalted status, making for music that's urgently alive even while it's shot through with contemplation.
Nic Jones, All About Jazz, USA, September 20, 2008

 

Harri Uusitorppa, Helsingin Sanomat, Finnland, 30. October 2008

 

Short Cuts, jazzwise, Great Britain, November 2008

 

Jenny Scheinman, JAZZthing, Deutschland, Nov. 2008 - Jan. 2009

 

 

On the face of it, Alien Huddle may seem like another notch on the belt for three well-seasoned veterans of experimental improvised music - each with her own language, capturing their collaboration and conversation in the studio, rather than in a club. Yet the experience of listening to this album proves that the meeting of these three musicians is more than chance, more than a mere session: it is a combination that works exceedingly well, an alchemic formula that smelts gold out of metals already individually precious in their own rights.

Each musician on this recording has defined her improvisational palette into a wholly individualized instrument: pianist Sylvie Courvoisier coming close to Boulez-ian angularity, solemn texture and explosive gesticulation; electronicist Ikue Mori with ear-cringing percussive ostinati and saxophonist Lotte Anker with a sense of melody and musical conversation falling most closely to the free jazz of the past 30 years. It is perhaps fitting that each track on this album is named after a bird, as the album’s beginning sounds like alien fowl in a huddle, as it were - thrown together and forced to converse. The avian metaphor fits best texturally for Mori’s treble-heavy electronics, but also plays well with Anker’s flowing solo lines in tracks such as “Crow and Raven” and “Ostrich War”.

Like actual birdsong, Alien Huddle reveals itself to be most concerned with texture - not cacophony, but rather the realization that what can seem ill-fitting actually, often, makes the most sense. As a layering of individual musical songs, this trio perhaps comes closest to the most basic rhythm/harmony/melody combination of all jazz: Anker’s alto layered on top of Courvoisier’s chromatic harmony on top of Mori’s crispy, arrhythmic beats. The mood of this trio is usually solemn and outspoken on tracks such as “Dancing Rooster Comp” but also blasts full-on in tracks like “Ostrich War”. The most interesting creation of this particular group, besides the very clear gestures of emotion and communication, is that their roles switch constantly: in this album’s textural huddle, it’s the collective output that trumps the individual’s contribution.
Ted Gordon, All About Jazz New York, December 2008

 

 

In dieser konzentrierten, dichten und intimen Form – die Aufnahme aus New York von Dezember 2006 ist herausragend, als ob man direkt daneben steht – gewinnt das Zusammenspiel dieses Trios zunehmend an beeindruckender Intensität. Jedes der Elemente ist klar, präzise, ja punktgenau zu hören, ohne jemals pedantisch zu wirken. Wir hören unglaubliche, wie sich aus dem Materialkonvolut logisch ergebenden Re-Kombinationen, Variationen, Bögen und Lücken, die eine hochintelligente wie lebendige Organik dieses großartigen synthetisch-natürlichen Improvisationsamalgans, in dem übrigens Vögel die Hauptrollen spielen, generieren. Die 11 Stücke sind kaum länger als jeweils fünf Minuten, erscheinen bei der größtmöglichen Offenheit, also dem steten Impuls und der Möglichkeit, dass ständig etwas passieren kann, spontan reflektierend in ihrer unverwechselbaren Individualität völlig klar und abgeschlossen, und erzeugen in ihrer Gesamtheit ein mitreißendes Panoptikum der konzentrierten Komplexität, in dem sich ständig neue Aussichten ergeben, ohne dass sich das Bewusstsein dafür ändern muss. Wie großartig ist das denn? Kann Musik nicht immer so wagemutig sein, aus zersplitterten Erzählungen, ohne jedes ernsthafte Pathos, dafür mit steinerweichender Konsequenz und Klarheit, diese gutgelaunt radikale und kohärente Stimmung zu zaubern, die in ihrer Unmittelbarkeit nicht nur die kleinen bequemen singulären Aussichtsluken, sondern vielmehr das große zusammenhängende Fenster öffnen kann? Und diesen Impuls muss uns einmal mehr die improvisierte Musik aufzeigen, die hier zum Glück so selbstverständlich – fast hätte ich "unkunstvoll" gesagt – wie nur denkbar daherkommt und daher einfach nur komplex wirken kann, ohne mit großen Gesten und platter Virtuosität zu nerven? Es ist Jazz, nicht Neinzz.
Honker, TERZ 12-2008, Deutschland

 

 

Hans-Jürgen von Osterhausen, Jazzpodium, Dezember 2008

 

Kurt Gottschalk, Signal to Noise, USA, Winter 2009

 

Celeste Sunderland, All About Jazz New York, January 2009

 

Celeste Sunderland, All About Jazz, USA, January, 24, 2009

 

Ljudbilden är klar och krispig som en tidig vårdag då luften känns tunn och sval. Anker, Courvoisier och Mori är de fria jazzljudens landskapister. De sliter, drar, exploderar i färg och de oväntade kasten är många. Men snarare än en vanlig ram skapar de en klangbild, som de relaterar till. Den slås obönhörligt fast i början av varje stycke. Det kan vara en komprimering av alla instrumenten spelade maximalt och med direkt utlösning. Då gäller det att behålla nivån och tätheten. Men det kan lika gärna vara små dröjande pluttrande ljud som svirrar runt. Här gäller det att hålla rätt på dem och behålla glesheten i spelet. Gles intensivitet. Så skulle jag kunna gå igenom vart och ett av de elva stycken, som alla är uppkallade efter fåglar och deras liv och samvaro. Alltså, ungefär som att sitta och titta på fågelbordet eller lyssna på den massiva konserten soliga vårdagar. Vi förbehåller oss tolkningsrätten och försöker strukturera vad vi lyssnar på. Njuta och rysa. Det blir en ganska rolig ingång i musiken.
För läser jag "Ostrich War" exploderar Ankers saxofon på ett speciellt sätt i mina öron. Liksom de små andetagen i "Blackbird" får en annan betydelse med titeln i minne. Faktiskt tror jag musikerna själva tillåtit sig dessa avgränsningar av musiken. På ett plan. Mer väsentligt är nog ändå det sätt de tar sig an de relativt korta styckena. Koncentrerar, sätter gräns, strukturerar.
Vi hör en märkligt motsägelsefull och samspelt trio. Lotte Anker är inte bara Danmarks men kanske en av Nordens intressantare saxofonister. Hon har jazzen i botten, och hennes spel är free jazz med en stor, fet ton.
Anblåsningen är stark, spelet utmärks av både ett stort tryck med snabb uppväxling och en svidande försjunkenhet. Det är ingen tillfällighet att hon sedan många år samarbetar med pianisten Marilyn Crispell. Schweiziska pianisten Sylvie Courvoisier är av en annan sort än Crispell. Mindre drömsk. Inte heller så perkussivt flödande våldsam. Hon har skarpt anslag, använder plötsliga vändningar och ett spel som gärna väver sig samman med medmusikernas. Kanske är hon mest känd för sitt samarbete med John Zorn, Susie Ibarra. Och förstås Ikue Mori. Det behövs väl knappast någon introduktion av denna breda musiker, DNAs legendariska slagverksspelare. De viktiga musiker hon jobbat med skulle fylla en hel sida. Utan mellanslag. Där finns en stor bredd, från fri impro till egensinnig rock. Hennes elektronik blandar perkussiva klanger med de andra. Gärna bygger hon upp ett slags stående gnistrande ljudkonglomerat. Hon sveper med flödande fantasi som den mästare hon är upp ängar, himlar, klyftor och höjder. Det är bara för kompisarna att kliva på.
Det är alltid dramatik i denna musik. Inga döda punkter. En tour de force bland flera tycker jag är "Night Owls", där Anker spelar sugande sentimentalt medan Courvoisier strör toner i Moris elektroniska, blonda rytmlåda. Kvar blir, då varje stycke tonat ut, en borrande känsla, som ett slags underförstådd dronton. Så väl lyckas dessa tre mästermusiker skulptera sin ljudvärld att den kropp vi inte ser eller kanske inte ens riktigt hör ändå upplevs. De undviker det överflödiga, litar på de musikaliska formerna och klangfärgerna. Korta fastslåenden och antydningar är nog. Tätare kan det knappt bli.

Thomas Millroth, www.soundofmusic.nu, Sweden, March 2009

 

E' sempre una sfida per la mente ed un piacere per il cuore imbattersi nelle manipolazioni elettroniche di Ikue Mori. Perché sotto le sapienti dita della musicista di origine giapponese, microchips, stringhe, byte, algoritmi e quant'altro si trasformano in materia viva, palpitante, con un'anima che esprime sentimenti e tocca le corde profonde delle emozioni.
Si susseguono così momenti di inquietante intensità ad altri di bucolica rilassatezza, cascate elettriche di bip e minimaliste sinfonie boreali, discreti accenni a drum-machine e nebulose distorsioni spaziali.
Si può capire così perché, nonostante la presenza di due strumenti dominanti come il sassofono ed il pianoforte, il nocciolo duro della registrazione, il suo centro nevralgico e strategico risultino proprio le diavoleri elettroniche di Ikue Mori. E tutto ciò senza nulla togliere alla grande prova di Sylvie Courvoisier e di Lotte Anker.
La pianista svizzera dispensa, al solito, pillole di saggezza musicale sdoganando lo strumento da un impiego canonico, sfruttandone risonanze e riverberi, giocando sulle corde con oggetti vari, proiettandolo in una dimensione onirica, quasi impalpabile.
La sassofonista danese, da anni protagonista della scena free/impro/avant scandinava e spesso attiva nella downtown newyorchese, trova modo di occupare con grande sensibilità gli opportuni spazi creati dalle trame compositive. Impressionista quando imbraccia il soprano, con il contralto ed il tenore insinua nel flusso sonoro un fraseggio, debitore del free storico, aggiungendo verticalità e graffi corrosivi ad una musica complessivamente scarna dal punto di vista dinamico.
Valutazione: 4 stelle.
Vincenzo Roggero, All About Jazz Italia, March 2009

 

Meandering – in a contradictory though positive fashion – the sounds on Alien Huddle ripple, wiggle and slither, when compared to Live at the Loft’s direct exposition. Discordant at points, the only time the three reach full cry is on the appropriately titled “Ostrich War”. On tenor, Anker overblows as if she was in rehearsal for a revival of the Machine Gun session, embellishing her solos with guttural honks, double-tongued runs and animalistic cries. Meantime Courvoisier plinks and plunks on her piano strings and Mori, who began her musical career in the1970s as drummer of the No Wave band DNA, directs her instrument’s buzzing oscillations and blurry signal processing towards a percussive space. With shaking cymbals vibrating on the piano’s internal strings for additional opaqueness, the piece’s climax involving echoing Woody Woodpecker-like cries from the saxophonist.
Despite that uncharacteristic noise detonation, most of the rest of the CD revolves around low-frequency keyboard fantasia, choked sighs and peeps from the saxophones and crackles, growls, pulses and loops from the electronics.
Among the knob-twisting and patching on a track like “Robins Quarrel” – a fowl battle that’s definitely more restrained than the ostriches’ conflict – irregular vibrations from Mori’s watery signal processing face off with rumbles and what appears to be a discordant reorganization of “Tea for Two” from the pianist. “Woodpecker Peeps” on the other hand doesn’t directly relate to the rat-tat-tats of that bird, but instead suggest quacking discord pulled from Mori’s programs.
Anker gets her chance to exhibit fortissimo multiphonics on “Dancing Rooster Comp” – continuing the aviary references – as she modulates from coloratura vibrato up to altissimo screams. All the while the other two use stopped and strummed piano innards or modulated flanged whooshes to provide the rhythmic bottom.
If one track provides summation of the trio’s interaction, it’s “Blackbird” which alternates quiet and noise. The former encompasses slapped piano keys, narrowed reed timbres and ring modulator-like whooshes and clangs. Spluttering and whistling electronic timbres, heavy syncopated piano chords and strident soprano sax squeals characterize the opposite mood.
Ken Waxman, www.jazzword.com, Canada, May 20, 2009

 

The trio on "Alien Huddle" is altogether different, not just in instrumentation but in their move toward non-idiomatic improvising. Throughout, Mori’s electronics seem to trace the contours of a kind of sonic firmament in which Anker and Courvoisier pinwheel. Anker’s playing has little to do, at least to my ears, with the avian theme of the recording (the disc’s title might be more apt in her case), and instead recalls a cross between Frode Gjerstad and the quavering tone of Larry Ochs. Mori is both expansive and minimalist, referential and abstract, often somewhat perversely resisting what Coirvoisier does. It’s a kind of friendly tension that works quite well, from the prepared piano, bleats, and overheated appliances on “Woodpecker Peeks” to the paper tearing and alto shrieks on “Dancing Rooster Comp.” And they also know just when to complement each other directly, as when they both engage in percussive volleys. I tended to prefer the softer, more abstract pieces like “Sparkling Sparrows,” since it’s in these that you get a clearer sense of the creativity in the details: the cello-like inside work from the pianist, the long floating tones from Anker’s tenor, and the groaning metal and rattled strings on “Night Owl.” Their group sound is distinctive and engaging; even to these sometimes jaded ears, there were some moments of bracing surprise, as on the rambunctious “Ostrich War” or the gorgeous “Whistling Swan.” A good one.
Jason Bivins, Cadence, USA, July/August/September 2009

 

 

Interview with Lotte Anker, Bjarne Søltoft, Jazznytt, Nr. 1 / 2013, Norway

 


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