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Here are a couple of quick hits on recent releases deserving your attention.

Bill Frisell/Thomas Morgan
Epistrophy (ECM)
A review
Epistrophy, the new release from guitarist Bill Frisell and bassist Thomas Morgan, offers nine live tracks culled from the same 2016 Village Vanguard sessions that gave us 2017’s Small Town album (reviewed here), also on ECM. If you liked that one . . . Frisell’s characteristic qualities are again found in abundance: the way he gives the music breathing room, the clarity and economy of his lines, the Western inflection in most everything he does, and his gorgeous tone. Morgan’s limber bass lines keep the music grounded and moving forward. The two cover a lot of ground stylistically. There’s a pointillistic “Red River Valley”—you can almost see the stars in the sky—balanced by the wide-ranging sonic exploration of Paul Motian’s “Mumbo Jumbo.” On the medley “Wildwood Flower”/“Save the Last Dance for Me,” Frisell seems to be having a conversation with both himself and Morgan—it’s almost a trio. Their rendition of “Lush Life” purges the song’s cynicism and offers a up a tender reflection that’s as comfortable as cocktail hour. On the title track, they deconstruct Monk’s tune, favoring big intervals and unspooling long lines. They close out the recording with a near lullaby version of “In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning.”

Yuriy Galkin
. . . For Its Beauty Alone (indie)
A review
Award-winning Russian bassist/composer Yuriy Galkin was not known to me before . . . For Its Beauty Alone showed up in my post office box, but I was familiar with the other three guys in his quartet: David Binney (alto sax and producer), Matt Mitchell (piano, Prophet 6 synth), and Rudy Royston (drums). It was these three articulate musicians whose presence demanded that the disc be introduced to the CD player, and I was well rewarded for the effort. The album’s 12 original tracks, according to Galkin, juxtapose the “uncertain and unjust times” with the ability to maintain a moral compass and find and respect the beauty of life. The expressive compositions, much of it through composed, might be considered chamber music in the jazz idiom, and it alternates between furious and eruptive energies and peaceful expanses. The cycling “Shifting Sands” (parts 1 and 2) seems unable to find terra firma. The furious energy of “Further Eruptions” is perfectly matched to Binney’s sax. “Camera Obscura” anxiously feels around in the dark for certainty. However, anxious these tracks may be, they point to a positive resolution. Other tracks explicitly offer solace and optimism. There’s the lovely reverie of the title track; “Cradle Song,” whose peaceful center hushes hints of a gathering storm; and the brief “Equilibrium,” which features Galkin’s bowed bass.

© 2019 Mel Minter