In 2008, when saxophonist / composer Colin Stetson released the first volume of his "New History Warfare" trilogy, he figured that the music would become more complex and more challenging from one album to the next.

And that has definitely been the case: "Vol. 3: To See More Light," released last month, is the most ambitious of the three.

"It's definitely been a progression," says Stetson, an Ann Arbor native who graduated from Pioneer High School and then earned a degree in saxophone performance from the University of Michigan School of Music in 1997.

"The music on all three albums fundamentally comes from the physical act of playing the instrument, so as my abilities have grown, my compositional abilities have become more further-reaching, and more vast in scope. By the time I did the third one, I was definitely drawing on a broader palette, and using bigger musical ideas," says Stetson, who comes to the Blind Pig on Friday.

"When I started this trilogy, I didn't have a grand design. I had a general idea of what the whole would be, and I knew I would flesh it out over time, that it was something that would bloom over the years."

When Stetson talks about the physical act of playing, he's referring to his signature circular-breathing technique and his ability to produce multiple voicings in real time—as opposed to using overdubs in the studio. And those abilities are clearly evident in his live performances. His masterful technique and the physicality of his playing prompted The New York Times to dub him a "one-man astonishment engine," while Pitchfock called him a "saxophone savant."

And when "New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges" was released in 2011, All About Jazz called it a "pure revelation," and it made the Top 10 lists of many critics for that year.

In addition to releasing several solo albums over the last 10 years or so, Stetson has also recorded or toured with the likes of Tom Waits, TV on the Radio, Arcade Fire, Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson. Before he began making his own albums, he was in Transmission, a local band that was founded in the mid-1990s when the members were still U-M students.

The music he has created on the trilogy draws from avant-jazz and from the noise/drone realm that includes such genres as dark metal and contemporary electronic music.

For the last two years, as he's been composing and recording the music for "Vol. 3," Stetson has also been a member of the Grammy-winning band Bon Iver. So, it made sense to him to bring in Bon Iver leader / singer / songwriter Justin Vernon to hande lead vocals on four tracks.

"Yeah, that was kind of a no-brainer, after us working together for the last couple of years," says Stetson by phone from his car, while en route from New York to Vermont for a gig. "A lot of the music on 'Vol. 3' was written while I was on tour with Bon Iver, so Justin and I had a lot of time to talk about the themes on the record, and we'd been wanting to work as a duo capacity, so it just happened.

"He has a real power of presence, and personality, to his vocals, and he's very versatile, more so than a lot of people might think. As a singer, he can can play a variety of characters."

"Vol. 3: To See More Light" was recorded live in single takes, using a variety of different microphone positions. The record's centerpiece is the epic, 15-minute-long title track, the longest piece Stetson has ever composed. His technical prowess is on full display, with its combination of heady arpeggios, metallic skronking and dirge-like movements. On tracks like "Brute" and "Hunted," he also delivers a blast of art-metal sax noise.

On the other side of the sonic coin are tracks like the comparatively subtle "Who The Waves Are Roaring For"—one of the songs featuring Vernon on vocals—and the celebratory interpretation of the Washington Phillips gospel song, "What Are They Doing In Heaven Today."

"I really have drawn a lot of inspiration from gospel, and I've also spent a lot of time listening to Glenn Gould. But I grew up listening to rock—a lot of Hendrix and metal, so that really influenced this music as well."

Stetson describes the theme of "Vol. 3" as being "generally, about how we experience the balancing act between love and death, and how they, as concepts, glean their meaning from one another in our experience of them."

When Stetson left Ann Arbor in 1998, he moved to San Francisco. He spent six years there, before living in New York City for four years and then relocating to Montreal in 2008.

The initial move to San Francisco was partly because he and the other members of Transmission thought it would be a great city to live and work in. But it was also due to his passion for the music of Tom Waits, who he eventually worked with, playing on Waits' albums "Alice," "Blood Money" and "Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards."

"I really wanted to go to San Francisco, because I knew he lived north of the city," says Stetson. "And I just had this dream that I would someday make music with him."

Kevin Ransom is a free-lance writer who covers music for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at KevinRansom10@aol.com.