DUAL IDENTITY
Mahanthappa and Lehman's hyper-modern compositional vision is brought to life by their remarkable quintet, featuring three musicians who represent the absolute state-of-the-art on their respective instruments: Damion Reid on drums, Matt Brewer on bass and Liberty Ellman on guitar. Ellman has become an established master, capable of asserting his one-of-a-kind instrumental voice, and Damion Reid and Matt Brewer have also earned an elite international reputation for their unique ability to execute the most demanding compositional materials with dazzling improvisational finesse.
"We won't get a history of contemporary jazz for some time, and the era of jazz stars known outside the jazz world is mostly over, but Mahanthappa and Lehman seem likely to find themselves well-ensconced in that future history…"
"Mahanthappa has sopped up Coltrane and the Karnatic tradition, but here blends in with Lehman, who learned his stuff from Jackie McLean and Anthony Braxton, with a more accessible take on the latter's compositional discipline."