This happy-go-lucky, unpretentious session was recorded in New Orleans and the blues sits at the core of an album that also draws on bebop, Latin rhythms and free jazz – there’s even a hint of opera. Kidd Jordan and Alvin Fielder had an association stretching back three decades, a history that, following Fielder’s death a few months after this session, came to a sad end. But, as they say in the Crescent City, oh, didn’t he ramble. The opening track, ‘C Melody’, is a spontaneous riff-grounded blues, motored by Fielder’s unfettered funk, which ignites strutting accompaniment from Parkers William and Chris. Fowler and Jordan weave ensemble lines that dig deep into the history, with harmonic flavouring that evokes Ornette. The fragmenting bebop phrases of the finger-snapping closing track, ‘Impromptu’, stir up similar mood-music and, in between, the music ranges from the ecstatic freedom-with-a-groove of ‘Guilty Happy’ to the sweet – at least at first – melodic curves of ‘Dopolaria’, derived from a Puccini opera, and the nursery-rhyme charm of the title-track, featuring Kelley Hurt. The sleeve notes don’t make clear whether Dopolarians has a future with a new drummer, but I hope so – there’s so much more to say.