Larry Stabbins: Aurora

After a long hiatus, reedman Larry Stabbins' renewed presence on the British scene offers cause for celebration. All the more so as Sarost, one of his prime contemporary outlets, matches him with partners of equal standing. Flanking him in a co-operative trio—whose name, derived from the first two letters of their constituent surnames, affirms the group's egalitarian ethos—reside drummer Mark Sanders and bassist Paul Rogers. Four studio cuts unfold a spacious dialogue built on sensitive listening and instrumental virtuosity, whether traversing a range of moods, as on the expansive "67 South" or digging into a single feel, like the brooding opening "First Lights."

Stabbins' broad hinterland encompasses not only stints with freedom-loving heavyweights such as reedman Peter Brötzmann, pianist Keith Tippett and drummer Tony Oxley, but also charted success as an integral part of soul jazz pop group Working Week in the 1980s. As a consequence, his fondness for reiterated phrases can as easily settle into extemporized melodies as muffled bleats, avoiding predictable resolution. Rather than defaulting to lead voice as so often the case in saxophone trios, his recurring patterns also bestow a loose structure to unruly developments, serving as a center around which drums and bass gyre.

This outfit's wide open expanses make a fine vantage point from which to appreciate Rogers' talents. A longtime comrade of saxophonist Paul Dunmall, most notably in Mujician, his custom-built 7-string bass gifts him an extended range that he possesses the musicality to fully exploit, spanning subterranean plucked pedal points, resonant slurred notes and ringing harmonics. He likewise has few peers when applying bow to strings, whether evoking the lyricism and logic of Bach's Cello Suites or careening up and down the bass clef with volatile sawing.

At one time, Sanders and Rogers formed the go-to rhythm axis in the London improvised arena until the bassist's move to France in 1991. On the evidence of their preternatural communication here—effortless shifts from conversational flurries to urgent churn—that longstanding connection survives intact. Sanders colors, accents and propels, often all at the same time, showing just why colleagues such as flautist Nicole Mitchell, pianist Myra Melford, trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith, reedmen Evan Parker and John Butcher, to name just a few, value him so much.

The closing "Boreas Curtains" acts as a summation: from the introspective start of low key hushed exchanges between Stabbins and Rogers, insistently repeated figures and a growing drum rumble gradually heighten tension, before the saxophonist's line solidifies into a stately anthemic theme from Tippett's Frames: Music For An Imaginary Film (Ogun, 1978), creating a conclusion in which the band honors lineage without leaning on it, fearlessly moving forward, even as they keep sight of where they have come from.

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