Trevor Watts / Barry Guy / Ramon Lopez: The First Touch

Trevor Watts and Barry Guy's near 60-year musical acquaintance yields an immediacy that continues undiminished on The First Touch. Recorded live in Poland in 2025 with drummer Ramon Lopez, a frequent cohort of the bassist, the seven tracks capture a trio whose empathy is matched by its appetite for risk. Although Watts' saxophones and Guy's bass naturally define the conversation, Lopez exerts a similarly decisive influence, propelling the performance through abrupt shifts of density, register and momentum.

In a volatile interplay, each musician alters shade, color and inflection in rapid retort to the others. As a result, each piece undergoes successive metamorphoses, rendering characterization futile, but entertainment maximal. The shared ability to turn as one, acting on imperceptible cues, elicits a series of "how did we get here?" moments. In that respect the trio recalls another of Guy's longstanding outlets, the cooperative threesome with saxophonist Evan Parker and drummer Paul Lytton.

Just as in that storied ensemble, Guy thrives on contrasts, alternating bowing and plucking, high and low registers, harshness and lyricism, dash and hover. Watts responds with an equally fertile stream of ideas, ranging from altissimo flourishes to blaring cries and more melodic passages without making the extremes feel obligatory.

Despite his formidable improvisational credentials, Watts has long shown an affinity for rhythmic foundations. Lopez supplies one here, although rarely in the form of a steady meter. Instead, his drumming arrives in kinetic waves of energy, spiced by sizzling cymbals and provocative crashes. Shouts of encouragement echo around the bandstand emphasizing the rapport.

Throughout the music pivots from full spate to drifting atmospherics in the blink of an eye, then perhaps alights on unsettling ambiguity as honeyed saxophone floats atop nervy bass taps and stuttering drums. Repeated cyclical phrases set up tension. Twittering soprano saxophone vies with high pizzicato and a whiff of tabla exoticism. Although ultimate destinations defy prediction, that does not deny roots. After spidery bass ripples and tappy percussion, "Birth Of The Voice" closes with songlike alto harking back to the African American tradition.

Although this tremendous recording faithfully documents the concert experience, the extended applause and onstage banter between the pieces interrupts the flow and might have benefited from judicious editing. Even so, The First Touch presents three partners whose collective language remains remarkably open-ended, proving that decades of familiarity can deepen spontaneity rather than flatten it into routine.