Two Voices Trading Space in Silence
Lyons and Cyrille trade breath and rhythm in a quiet, searching duet that rewards patient listening.
This is a sparse, conversational duet. Jimmy Lyons's alto saxophone moves in long, unhurried phrases, often sitting back while Andrew Cyrille's percussion fills the space with shifting textures rather than a steady pulse. The mood is reflective and a little austere, more about listening to each other than about showing off, and the pace stays mostly slow and open.
The album was recorded in February 1981 at Soundscape in New York City, but it did not appear until 1988, when the Black Saint label released it. That gap matters: the music belongs to the early 1980s New York avant-garde, when Lyons and Cyrille were both deep in the Cecil Taylor circle and working on their own terms. Here the two of them strip the format down to its essentials.
Reviewers have been generally favorable. The Penguin Guide to Jazz and Tom Hull, writing on the web, both gave it strong marks, and Hull's A- is the more enthusiastic of the two. The AllMusic review was more measured, awarding three stars. For a listener new to either musician, this is a fine place to hear them as partners rather than as leaders and sidemen. It is not the first record to reach for, but it is a good one for anyone curious about how Lyons's lyricism works without a piano or bass to lean on.
Who's playing
Jimmy Lyonsalto saxophone
Andrew Cyrillepercussion
