Jason Kao Hwang/EDGE

American-born Chinese violinist/composer Jason Kao Hwang has created works ranging from jazz and classical to contemporary composition and world music. He leads the quartet EDGE as well as Spontaneous River, an orchestra of string improvisers. As a violinist, he has worked with many artists including Anthony Braxton, William Parker, Butch Morris, and Henry Threadgill. As a composer, his chamber opera The Floating Box, A Story in Chinatown was named one of the top 10 opera recordings of 2005 by Opera News. Hwang’s ensemble EDGE plays a rich weave of jazz and chamber music with Eastern musical traditions, particularly Chinese, Korean, and Japanese. Stories Before Within (Innova) is the second disc from this excellent group. In a review, Signal to Noise magazine lauds Hwang’s ability to “synthesize his influences to come up with a slew of unadorned melodies, situating these at the heart of rhythmically dense group passages and open-ended improvisatory features.” AllAboutJazz.com muses, “as the last note fades, tragically, the listener is left with something enduring and beautiful.” With Taylor Ho Bynum cornet, Ken Filano bass, Andrew Drury drums.