Daniel Carter: Telepathic Mysteries, Vol. 2

Do we ever run out of music? Do the fanboy and girl ever forget their first song? Do composers, and players of every stripe (though the court is out on most pop mavens and mistresses), ever come upon their very last note? Saxophonist, multi-reedist and free-jazz icon Daniel Carter certainly has not. And Telepathic Mysteries Vol. 2 may just be Carter's key witness. For more often than not, the rhizome-like symbiotic crusade that the album embarks upon is a music that is something more, something else other than another open-ended gathering of conversational saints in a loft in a studio somewhere in lower Manhattan.

Telepathic Mysteries Vol. 2 holds a viable, symphonic grandness that sustains well beyond first, second and third listening. Conducted by the inexhaustible Carter, such loosely choreographed suites, chorales and tone studies as "Freedom Maze Sighway," "Mayaland," "Under Full Space Arrest," and "Restive-au-rant," challenge any concerto or etude that readily comes to mind.

All the music here continues Carter's great artistic goal—to maintain human balance and connection—with his most trusted band of confidantes, namely clarinetist Patrick Holmes, piano/keyboardist Matthew Putman, bassist Hilliard Greene, and drummerFederico Ughi. Together they cross wide waters, fjord unknown spaces and create a viscerally dynamic sound sculpture that captures as much brio and capriciousness as most chansons and the purely improvised. Though by nature it is kin to the gazillion or so recordings and sessions that Carter has enhanced in his lifetime, Telepathic Mysteries Vol. 2 stands above most.