Vijay Iyer & Wadada Leo Smith: Defiant Life

As passionate as each man is intelligent, both pianist/composer Vijay Iyer and trumpeter/composer Wadada Leo Smith also manifest healthy egos. Accordingly, collaborations like Defiant Life require each man to contour his skills to complement the other sufficiently. Their shared humility is intrinsic to solidifying the inspiring bond that arises from the two not only playing, but composing together.

In the end, the generosity of spirit maximizes the potency of the art these men create on this second of their collaborations (the first was A Cosmic Rhythm With Each Stroke (ECM Records, 2016).

"Prelude: Survival" is an opening cut that unfolds with such pervasive, mysterious grace, it sets the tone for the entire album. On "Sumud," Iyer and Smith take their time The deliberate pace they maintain belies the relatively speedy recording of these half-dozen tracks in two days of single takes in Switzerland during July of 2024.

These musicians proceed through this number as if by their own sense of time. Iyer's use of the Fender Rhodes electric piano accentuates the dreamlike aura conjured in combination with Smith's slowly wafting horn lines. The juxtaposition of those tracks, like the rest of the program's sequencing, is as wise as the placing of "Floating River Requiem (for Patrice Lumumba.)" Both acoustic piano and horn exude a great melancholy on this very next cut, but it is a painful sensation in the process of healing as the music evolves.

Similarly, the title image of "Kite" provides the duo a goal to which they can aspire. "Elegy: The Pilgrimage" is not much less melancholy than its surroundings, but it is in keeping with the underlying theme of this project—'faith in human possibility.' Accordingly, there are glimpses of light, not only in the ringing of the higher piano notes over the steadfast low tones, but also from the trumpet lines radiating upward.

The hints of resolution there are as deceptive as those of Iyer and Smith's shared resolve over the entire course of Defiant Life. Yet those threads are indeed present, if not exactly manifest, signifying a restraint that, fortunately, precludes even a smattering of anything heavy-handed. On the contrary, each successive cut is as absorbing as the last, if not more so.

To be sure, this second pairing of the souls and the intellects of Vijay Iyer and Wadada Leo Smith is picturesque music from start to finish. Fittingly, the quiet but purposeful conclusion that is "Procession: Defiant Life" directly references the staunch attitude at the heart of the album's title and, by extension, the full extent to which that mindset permeates the music.