Twine Forest

Pianist Angelica Sanchez has been carving out a respected career playing jazz on the outer edges. Here, on her fifth album as a leader, she\'s joined by well-established avant-garde trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith. While Smith is an acclaimed composer (most recently for his epic *Ten Freedom Summers*) with dozens of albums, this duo set features him as a sideman playing Sanchez’s compositions. Sanchez is certainly up to the challenge; she has an ear for angular chords and elliptical lines and can play them with a variety of textural effects (the fluttering sound on “Echolocation” is particularly impressive). Smith winds in and around her with a brittle tone and his own substantial burrs, pops, moans, and use of space that conjures late-‘60s Miles Davis. Standout tracks include the title track (with its swirls of sound) and the jaunty game of cat and mouse called “Cones of Chrome.” The somber “Veinular Rub” finds Smith in particularly fine form. One gets the sense that this effort really forced Sanchez and Smith to each stretch, so let’s hope there’s more to come.