Improvised by Paul Olson
Improvised, the debut duet album from super-veteran flautist Jeremy Steig and almost-as-seasoned guitarist Vic Juris, is just that: an album of almost completely improvised material. Recorded in Steig’s home (don’t be put off by that, by the way, because home recording has come a long. long way) in a situation where the two musicians played in separate rooms, connected only by headphones to each other, it’s spontaneous musical communication of the highest order…
…The chordal, quickly responsive comping of Juris’s acoustic seem tailor made to Steig’s ruminations, and the same relaxed intimacy pervades the two covers. Charlie Parker’s “Billie’s Bounce” while completely musically faithful, has been effectively “de-bebopped” (the nervous, skittering intensity of the original has been replaced with the rockin’-chair groove of this musical setting), despite the fact that Steig’s solo therein swings mercilessly. Thelonious Monk’s “Friday the Thirteenth” is even better, though, with a partially vocalized flute solo that is downright, and perhaps here incongruously, intense…