Six scenes, one marketplace.

Meridian records small ensembles close, in rooms with a long tail, and cuts them warm and flat with nothing overdubbed after the fact.

Lowfield leaves one microphone running in places at the hour they belong to nobody — a working yard at first light, a crossing at the turn of the tide, a room at the end of a shift — and presses the take whole.

Northgate builds a patch, records it live to two tracks with nothing bounced, and stops when the tape does.

Ostinato books a room for an afternoon, runs the tape through the whole date, and keeps the take the group argued about.

Stillwater works by subtraction — one held tone, one wide field, one change you will not catch arriving — and cuts low enough that the room joins in.

Union Hall takes a night off the desk or the broadcast feed and presses it as it stood, applause running into the next tune, false starts included.