Ron Carter and Bill Frisell at Birdland

Ron Carter and Bill Frisell
Birdland 
Ron Carter Annual Residency 
New York, NY
October 15, 2026

Ron Carter and Bill Frisell have sustained a thirty-year mutual admiration society, praising each other in a way that goes beyond the usual platitudes spouted by artistic collaborators. The veteran bassist—now 89—has said of the singular guitarist that "he listens closely, experiments freely, and consistently finds ways to surprise. His work rewards patience and deep listening." Frisell—who's now 75—has described Carter as "a national treasure." He's even written a tribute composition to the bassist—named, appropriately, "Ron Carter."

Over the 75 minutes of the Thursday early set at Birdland, Carter and Frisell demonstrated their unusually empathetic musical relationship. Enhancing their bond is that, for all their acclaim, both are musicians given to self-effacement and to focusing more on collective creativity than personal triumphs. They're also adventurers who share a yen for going where the moment takes them, rather than staying neatly within traditional structures.

Those traits especially shone through in a configuration as compact and flexible as a duo. The Birdland performance was one of intense mutual listening and surprising explorations, even on the familiar jazz standards that dominated the setlist.

An example was their mid-set, off-beat excursion into "Body and Soul." Their take began (and ended) with Frisell playing alone, and only occasionally referencing the chordal structure of the piece. As the performance developed, Carter and Frisell all but dispensed with the customary solo and support structure. The spotlight didn't so much alternate between the players as be equally distributed.

During Frisell's first solo, for example, Carter supported the guitarist with a series of descending and diverting triplets. When the roles ostensibly shifted, Frisell deployed a panoply of textures and stop-and-start comping over Carter's  expansive and melodic soloing. If this description makes the overall result sound crowded and over-busy, it wasn't. Such was the skill and careful restraint of this musical partnership.

Carter's fame derives from his unequalled log, at least for a bassist, of some 2,000 jazz recordings over a career of nearly 70 years. Lesser known are his many sessions outside jazz, with artists ranging from Billy Joel to Last Poets. At Birdland, the ultimate showcase for Carter's eclecticism was—as it often is within his sets in recent years—a long (even a bit overlong, perhaps, at nearly 10 minutes) solo rendition of "You Are My Sunshine." Musically simple, the song's melody became a springboard for Carter to take tangents, both technically (playing a series of harmonic notes up his instrument's neck; using his thumb and index finger for a full-hand span of notes) and compositionally (musically quoting both  "Tumbling Tumbleweeds" and J.S. Bach's "Unaccompanied Cello Suite No.1").

Frisell, too, has a wide musical palette—another point of kinship with Carter. As in his recent, similarly masterful duet with Ambrose Akinmusire at the New School, Frisell's playing included occasional discordant squawks, echoing his seminal 1980s work with The Bill Frisell Band, and melodic Americana-ish turns, reflecting his deep love for folk and country, which has yielded collaborations with the likes of Lucinda Williams and Alison Krauss + Union Station.

As with past years, Carter continues his October residency at Birdland with (obviously larger) configurations next week.