The marvellous new album from two of jazz’s outstanding masters in their first duo recording is a triumph.
~ Courtesy DL Music Media
Guitarist John Scofield and bassist Dave Holland, two of jazz’s contemporary masters, have played together over the years in contexts including work with Herbie Hancock and Joe Henderson and a spirited co-led band with Joe Lovano and Al Foster called ScoLoHoFo. Memories of Home is their first duo album.
John Scofield takes up the story: “I honestly don’t recall when or how we first discussed playing duo together. It was quite a while ago and we had an entire tour scheduled that was scrapped in 2020 due to the pandemic. We did it in late 2021 and it worked well. We did a second tour in 2024 and the idea of recording was a natural conclusion. The record, like our live shows, features tunes each of us composed, some new, some old. We share decades of common references musically. The similarities and differences in our approaches make for a more interesting collaboration, I think.”
Among those common musical references, Miles Davis looms large. Scofield’s tenure with Miles from 1982-1985 had been of decisive importance for the guitarist, much as Holland’s time with Davis had in the period 1968-70. Miles is one of the “icons” invoked in Scofield’s composition “Icons at the Fair”, which opens Memories of Home. The tune was inspired by Herbie Hancock’s arrangement of “Scarborough Fair” on The New Standard – an album on which both John and Dave played – Scofield taking its chords to construct something new, with a melody alluding to a Milesian trumpet phrase. It’s a piece John introduced with his Combo 66 quartet; the duo version has its own sense of dynamic drive.
Holland’s “Mr B” is a tribute to his first double bass hero, Ray Brown, which Dave previously recorded on Points of View in 1997. Its blues feel and lithe sense of swing are ideally suited to Scofield’s guitar artistry, and Holland’s bass solo conveys some of the sense of joy that informed the playing of the tune’s dedicatee. “Not for Nothin’” and “You I Love” also update pieces premiered on Holland’s early ECM recordings – the former the title track of Dave’s 2001 quintet album, the latter first heard on 1984’s Jumpin’ In, effectively the beginning of Holland’s life as a bandleader.
Title piece “Memories of Home” reintroduces a Holland tune originally documented on a 1980s collaboration with progressive bluegrass musicians Vassar Clements and John Hartford. The tune’s gentle contours encourage Scofield to give voice to the country side of his playing. Among the most immediately identifiable of jazz instrumentalists, Scofield and Holland have always been open to influences beyond the tradition.
“Meant to Be” is a Scofield classic, which the guitarist has played in line-ups from trio to the big band of Mike Gibbs. The poignant ballad “Easy for You”, another well-known piece, brings forth tender and subtle playing from both men, while the angular melody of “Mine Are Blues” is given momentum by Holland’s hard-driving bass.