Clarinetist Jimmy Giuffre died in Massachusetts two springs ago. His last gig with his last major trio (reportedly) paid them 35 cents each (in 1960s money). His last record with that trio — Free Fall, featuring Paul Bley on piano and Steve Swallow on bass — pretty much tanked on arrival. From that point on, this Woody Herman alumnus and author of the Third Herd's famed "Four Brothers" hit, lost his genius mojo.

Yet history has been redemptive.

Since 1962, Free Fall has influenced musicians of every stripe, because it's an early and austere hybrid of avant-garde chamber music and small-group jazz. It doesn't have an obvious beat pattern (no percussion) and the harmonic structure is, um, opaque. It's about as "out" as they come. It was downright ballsy. It takes guts to leap into the unknown. And then find your way back. Such was evident Friday night during a performance at Firehouse 12 by a band called Whirr!

Drummer George Schuller led this six-man combo through a handful of tunes from Giuffre's magical period — a lush lawn of cool tones, soft beats, and a kind of navel-gazing quality that would fit right in at any rock club (maybe).

Guitarist Joel Harrison co-led the group. He and Schuller layered poignant sounds overtop frontline harmonies by Billy Drewes (clarinet), Ohad Talmor (tenor), and Jacob Garchik (trombone and accordion). Timbres seemed otherworldly (as when chimes synced with electric guitar to create the sonic equivalent of a Zen koan), leaving you wondering where the fuck that came from.

Ironically, while the sextet floated in the intellectual ether, it seemed to occasionally anesthetize itself with its efforts. Maybe a Red Bull was in order. Fortunately, energy waves crested toward the end thanks to a driving pulse by bassist Cameron Brown. That's a minor complaint about an otherwise scintillating ensemble. I'm sure it will find an eager and demanding audience wherever it goes. I'm looking forward to Round 2.

Meanwhile, Southern Connecticut State University presents its Creative Music Orchestra on Nov. 3 (Garner Recital Hall, Engleman Hall Room 112-C; $5; 203-392-6630, southernct.edu). The ensemble is the brain child of David Chevan, professor of music. Fewer students play violin than play guitar, Chevan thought. So he conceived a group that would play music for whatever instrumentation was available. The current group includes two percussionists (drum kit), two bassists, three guitarists, two saxophonists and one violinist. The challenge is finding music to play, and in fact, there isn't much of the time. So Chevan and his students compose their own.

"Whoever I have shapes my material," he says. "My composing style is malleable."

Chevan's other group is Afro-Semitic Experience. It specializes in spiritual music that's not religious by way of combining the Jewish and African traditions. The band's new CD, The Road That Heals the Splintered Soul, comprises brand-new original material and comes out Nov. 14 at the Charter Oak Cultural Center in Hartford.

"It centers on the idea of transformation through geographic change," he says.