Mural + Vic Firth and the Lutherans

It's no surprise that the Norwegian-Australian trio Mural (comprised of percussionist Ingar Zach, guitarist Kim Myhr and reedman Jim Denley) will find a fitting home in the semi-rarified spiritualism of Houston's Rothko Chapel on Thursday night. Their music - popping, fluttering woodwinds, plaintive but terse guitar rattle and airy bells and gongs - certainly stands in respectful relief to Mark Rothko's malleable color fields. It will be equally interesting to see how they transform the space of Austin's AAMP on Saturday night. Mural's music, which at times recalls Tony Scott's Music for Zen Meditation as well as English sound artists like Clive Bell and Sylvia Hallett, is both cavernous and intimate, much like the Austin Art and Music Partnership space.

Norway has been giving the area a spring blitz this year, with Frode Gjerstad's trio coming through in February and the Oslo-Chicago group Free Fall hitting on March 12. What's particularly great is that all three of these groups are very different, with Mural being the furthest from traditional jazz and improvised music structures.

Vic Firth and the Lutherans, a trio comprised of Austin percussionists Chris Cogburn and Nick Hennies, along with Bay Area guitarist (and former Austinite) Kurt Newman, opens the concert.

Mural Myspace