John Abercrombie’s new quartet album 39 Steps is a bit different to last year’s standards outing Within a Song, which featured Joe Lovano. This time Lovano is absent and Philly-born pianist Marc Copland joins the revered 68-year-old New York state-born guitarist, Copland appearing on ECM for the first time. The pair in the 1970s were members of film composer drummer Chico Hamilton’s quartet (Copland played alto sax then) as well as Dreams and have played together in many other situations besides these seminal groups. Copland and Abercrombie are joined by close associate bassist Drew Gress, and Abercrombie’s long time drummer Joey Baron. Tunes are Abercrombie’s composition ‘Vertigo’; Copland’s ‘LST’; Abercrombie’s ‘Bacharach’, ‘Greenstreet’, and ‘As it Stands’; Copland’s ‘Spellbound’; Abercrombie’s ‘Another Ralph’s;  the quartet-written ‘Shadow of a Doubt’; Abercrombie’s ’39 Steps’, the title track; and the Ernie Burnett/George A Norton standard ‘Melancholy Baby’. The album was recorded in the spring at Avatar in New York and is released on 23 September. John Abercrombie pictured