Brad Mehldau in his sprawling beautifully written bildungsroman Formation makes a comment about virtuosity - particularly in regards prog rock - and how it shouldn't be criticised because it is virtuosic thus taking on punk rockers everywhere. His basic point is that it is good to be a great, technically gifted, muso - what's wrong with that - rather than someone who despises being able to play.

Summer (born 1995) is a former member of top German youth jazz orchestra the Bundesjazzorchester and debuted in April 2020 with Schumann Kaleidoskop. Robert Schumann, to return to where we started with Mehldau, is also close to the omniverous American's heart.

And it is as obvious as daylight that Summer playing solo here is a very fine, virtuosic, classical, player who has made the leap to improvise in a style that sounds distinctly her own.

Each track here, an improvisation, has a classical composer as a title which is a fairly grandiose (prog again in affinity?) if nicely title-headline grabbing thing to do. Sometimes the tracks seem to fit the name. However, sometimes they don't at all. The 'Beethoven' track doesn't sound particularly Beethoven at first, but by the time you reach the heart of it perhaps you can tell a bit more. Perhaps you can't. Wrestle with your conscience over that conundrum.

The names themselves to be perfectly fair are jumping off points. A blind listening surely would not make any connection to most of the composers. More broadly it is interesting how artists can be inspired by a thought and then deliver something which is entirely different.

Resonanzen is a serious listen - it becomes less earnest as it continues and the Ravel, Grieg, Scriabin and Tchaikovsky tracks are the pick as the mood shifts and more sunshine floods the room. But right at the beginning the soft quietude Summer conjures even on the hidebound 'Bach' track is pretty special.

Does Resonanzen come over more classical than jazz? Hard to say. But it is certainly not a hardcore improviser record at all in terms of massive dissonance or elaborate free for alls. There is always huge control and discipline in the method. There seems to be very little obvious even free-improv jazz language on display at any point. But it does not go into étude mode which a lot of chamber-jazz by default does so that is to its great credit because that can be very sterile as a listen and this album isn't that and instead contains some very affecting passages beyond any specific analysis of vocabulary or style. Joanna Summer, photo: Gregor Hohenberg/ACT