No fewer than 14 guitarists and three rhythm sections make up the Alternative Guitar Summit – an annual live event transferred in 2021 to a studio by the pandemic – which got together to honour the then ailing Pat Martino, the Philadelphia virtuoso who brought the lyrical legacy of Wes Montgomery into a funkier, more aggressively electrical era. Martino did it without losing any of Wes' long-throw melodic imagination, seamlessly reshaping apposite improv for chorus after chorus - but, unlike Montgomery, he was a prolific composer too.

All nine pieces here are Martino's - and judging by 'Vol 1' of the title, there's plenty more to come. On the face of it, this is a guitar buff's delight (Bill Milkowski's liner notes meticulously box-tick the provenance of every instrument played on the set), but the best of the playing goes way beyond that. Rogers and Peter Bernstein make a cool-swinging mid-tempo job of Martino's Montgomeryesque 'Inside Out', the pair endlessly complementing each other's phrasing with countermelodies. Fareed Haque's acoustic playing is surrounded by whistly synth sounds and seamlessly funky bass and drums on 'Line Games', Rez Abbasi and Jeff Miles turn impressionistic sonic swirls into hard-accented chord-melody funk on 'Noshufuru', and Russell Malone's solo account of the JJ Johnson ballad 'Lament' is a meticulously exquisite standout.

And a surefootedly bop-swinging one is 'On The Stairs', with its thumping bassline walk and unmissable distinction between the solo styles of Dave Stryker and Paul Bollenbeck, particularly in the ways they and the rhythm section swap the closing phrases. This is precise yet exhilaratingly inviting guitar jazz, which could hardly be a more fitting tribute to Pat Martino, one of its true high priests.