Duo recordings present a series of traps for musicians that can produce less-than-successful outcomes: Each pushes his own agenda, and they cannot get in step with one another. They fall into numbing lockstep with one another. They overplay to fill the space. One commands the space to the detriment of the other. And so on. Happily, Blued Dharma* from pianist Adrean Farrugia and saxophonist Joel Frahm falls into none of these traps, instead offering one of the more ebullient and satisfying jazz recordings of 2018 to date.
Maybe it helps that the two have played together for nine years in drummer Ernesto Cervini’s groups. (Indeed, it was on a tour with Cervini when the two were playing together during a sound check that Frahm suggested they make a duo record.) Whatever the explanation, these two melodists speak the same musical language and are each completely comfortable in their own skin and remarkably attuned to one another. Conversations and confluences abound as they push one another playfully into expanding spaces, each sparking ideas off the other as readily as metal on flint.
The program includes five Farrugia compositions and two standards, Oscar Hammerstein/Jerome Kern’s “Nobody but Me” and Ray Noble’s “Cherokee” in two very different versions. (In the second version, oddly titled “Cherokee I,” which starts wistfully before hardening, the two make you hear the head without actually playing it. Neat trick.) Farrugia demonstrates a comfortable range of mood and style in his compositions: playful and spritely on the title track, deeply warm on the homage “For Murray Gold,” soulful on “Gospell,” funky on “Cool Beans,” celebratory on “Half Moon (for Sophia).”
The musicians’ command of their instruments and their attention to detail and one another allow them to communicate with economy and eloquence. There’s serious, sometimes breathtaking music aplenty on Blued Dharma,* but it never takes itself too seriously and is always on the lookout for something to celebrate. It’s an accessible treasure.