The co-led team of bassist Mark Saltman and pianist William Knowles serves up vintage and classic hard bop sounds with an extra pizzaz supplied by violinist-guitarist Leonard Brown and a team of Keith Butler/dr and mixed and matched horns of Michael Fitzhugh-Deandre Schaefer/tp-fh, Robert Muncy-Grant Langford/sax and Lori Williams-Yvette spears/voc.
What is also mixed and matched are the tunes, as you get some swinging originals, such as the bopping “Dororo” pulsed along by Saltman’s probing fingers and the Jazz Messengerish “Ruben” with the horns supplemented by the gorgeous violin . But added on are some clever covers, like Williams cooing through David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” as well as her gliding around Schaifer’s horn on a clever read of Tears For Fears’ “Everybody Wants To Rule The World”. Williams and Spears share the mic over the staccato’d beat of The Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams with the team digging in deep. The melding of Muncy’s soprano and Brown’s violin make for ecstasy on the bopping “Nate’s Advice” with Knowles giving some bluesy saloon work on “Native Speaker”. Fresh modern hues of classic portraits.