John Scofield & Dave Holland: Memories Of Home

"Jazz is best when it's completely carefree. The only problem is when you care about the music more than anything in the world—how do you get carefree?" John Scofield raised the conundrum in a a 2023 interview, though you suspect he has been working out the riddle his entire career. Ditto bassist Dave Holland. On Memories Of Home, the revered guitarist and double bassist strike the perfect balance between care and carefree on a set of texturally rich compositions that birth vivid improvisations.

Scofield and Holland have convened intermittently over the years, beginning with Joe Henderson's Verve Records best-seller So Near, So Far (Musings for Miles) in 1993. They played on Herbie Hancock's The New Standard (Verve Records, 1996) and on Chris Potter's Unspoken (Concord Jazz, 1997). Six years later they recorded OH! (Blue Note Records, 2003) with ScoLoHoFo—a supergroup also featuring saxophonist Joe Lovano and drummer Al Foster. Great projects all, but such is the heartfelt symmetry of Scofield's and Holland's interplay on this, their debut as a duo, that there persists the nagging feeling that they should have done this many moons ago.

Their duo bow, in fact, came with a run at the Blue Note, New York, in late 2019. Fresh off a further string of summer dates in 2024, they entered the NRS studio in the Catskills to record these road-tested compositions; some are freshly penned, others well-loved. Among the former, "Icons at the Fair" draws inspiration from Herbie Hancock's interpretation of Paul Simon's "Scarborough Fair"-by way of a Miles Davis melody that caught Scofield's ear during his tenure in the trumpeter's band. Scofield's single note line, flecked with shimmer and spark, and Holland's lithe walking bass do not so much lead and follow as enfold.

When Holland solos—sublimely so on the pastoral ballad "Meant To Be" and in swinging, singing mode on "Mr. B," the bassist's Ray Brown homage—Scofield's comping is feather-light. By contrast, when the guitarist bends strings to his wily will, cooking up straight-ahead burn on "Mine Are Blues" or simmering country blues on the lovely title track, Holland's presence is constant and probing. On the latter tune there are echoes of Holland's early '70s bluegrass-country adventures— in the very same Catskills—with multi-instrumentalist-singer John Hartford, string player Norman Blake, and fiddler Vassar Clements. What goes round...

Conversational shadow play and on-the-wing exchanges melt into brief but organic unison passages, notably on "Not for Nothin.'" Launching from an infectious Holland ostinato, the bassist's unfailing grooves pave Scofield's delightfully gnarly path. Throughout, the contrast between Scofield's gritty, slightly distorted edge and Holland's silky flow makes for compelling chemistry—no more so than on Scofield's exquisite ballad "Easy for You," with gorgeous solos from bassist and guitarist in turn, and on the gently waltzing "Memorette." The snappy rhythms and interweaving lines of Holland's "You I Love" follow the post-bop lineage in style.

From swing to post-bop, and from balladry to country-blues, Scofield and Holland feel right at home on a session full of warmth, tenderness and passion. Hopefully, there is a lot more to come from a duo that honors the past while looking forward.