A double album of mainly Innanen compositions beginning with the title track this is old school free-jazz in a way. A new-ish name meets two legends of the music.

I suppose this all connects with Ornette Coleman’s bluesier side in its best bits, and virtuoso reedist Innanen has his array of instruments using, besides alto and baritone saxes, Indian clarinet and an uilleann pipe chanter among other exotica. Parker, one of the great avant bassists on the planet is a thoughful presence on ‘A Morning, a Day, a Night’; while free-jazz legend Cyrille is a delight, swinging away on ‘See You at 103’ written by the Finnish leader in Copenhagen and dedicated to Kasper Tranberg; or, in other places, the former Cecil Taylor Unit stalwart can simply be very expressionistic, really open and free on ‘Blue in Nublu.’

The second disc, recorded in 2012 two years after the music on the first, is no less vital but is the more challenging of the two, a series of sprawling duos that can be a bit hit and miss (the very nature of the music) but where you can hear Cyrille best and really get to know the interplay between reeds and drums. Numbered  as ‘Songs’ from 1-6 they arise from the Finnish leader’s first duo performances with Cyrille recorded live in a Brooklyn studio during a mini-festival in which Innanen also performed, but not heard here, with a range of avant and free jazz luminaries. If you like Alexey Kruglov then try Innanen for size. But solo Cyrille, say at the beginning of ‘Song V’, is one of the most memorable aspects of this stimulating release, the exotica of the Irish chanter that comes next adding a curling, highly uncertain element, charged with a sense of exhilarating surprise. SG