Track of the day is drawn from Healing Power: The Music of Carla Bley out on 8 July and new from Steve Cardenas, top, publicity photo, Ben Allison and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra saxist Ted Nash - in other words a very ''acoustic-sounding'' setting involving guitar, double bass and reeds. These fine players are all leaders heard elsewhere in their own right and came together again given their longstanding association as playing partners to record Healing Power a year ago at a studio in rural Pennsylvania. Carla Bley piece 'Ictus' is first known from its inclusion on the 1965-released Paul Bley Quintet album Barrage (ESP Disk) and was covered most recently back in 2018 in a much more riotous trio version by drummer Tamaya Honda and pals. With no drummer on the Cardenas trio's version the arrangement on this new release is quite different. Nash does a lot of the running and sounds a little Paul Desmond-like at times crucially within a Giuffrian panorama. Allison is very fast and plays extremely cleanly while Cardenas when his moment comes is airily thoughtful and it is as if he has all the time in the world.
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