Violinist Mark Feldman has had an astonishingly rich and varied musical life. He cut his teeth performing classical music as a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, jammed in rock bar bands, and spent six years in Nashville playing country. Moving to New York in the 1980s, he became part of the downtown scene, struck up an association with John Zorn, served in the band of guitarist John Abercrombie and forged a fertile partnership with Swiss pianist Sylvie Courvoisier. You can hear all these influences and more on his new solo album Sounding Point (a belated follow-up to 1994's Music For Violin Alone). As you might expect, his technical skills are phenomenal, whether he's bowing strident and precise or engaging in unusual extended techniques. On opening track, ‘As We Are,’ he interlaces the two extremes, sliding out of firm lyricism to fizzle and flash, or using the fingers of his left hand to pluck a clipped pizzicato while simultaneously bowing. Elsewhere, he uses overdubbing to create miniature symphonies as on his version of Ornette Coleman's ‘Peace Warriors,’ where he departs from the jaunty fanfare of the theme to summon sudden flurries of sirens, ghostly harmonics and even a snippet of hoedown.