All the accumulated wisdom and curiosity of a half-century at the sharp end of jazz – but none of the conservatism that can sometimes strike the music’s revered elders – still drives the work of pianist Aki Takase. The classically-schooled Osaka-born virtuoso celebrated her 70th birthday with the scorching 2019 quintet set Thema Prima (free jazz, turntables, swing, noise and the odd burst of Fats Waller stride) and is just as loose and unpredictable in this very different setting of 14 short duo dialogues with one of her favourite saxophonists, the Brooklyn-based German original Ingrid Laubrock. Improv and composition often segue indistinguishably, as in the opening ‘Luftspiegelung’, in which diaphanous piano trickles and soft low tones laced with mournful upper sounds from Laubrock’s tenor are corralled by an emphatic melody halfway in. A strutting, Kurt Weill-ian dance (‘Harlekin’), a warm-toned soprano theme over a deep piano trill (‘Chimera’), Evan Parker-like tenor multiphonics against sombre low chords (‘Scurry’), Spanish-dance flurries and staccato stampings (‘Andalusia’), and the poignant, gracefully-spiralling tenor lines and delicate treble-piano reflections of the closing title-track are among the standouts of a variously tranquil, impetuous and sometimes spiky meeting of minds.