Joe Lovano showed he's much more than a masterful post-bop barnstormer and lush balladeer on his first outing as leader Trio Tapestry with ECM last year, which in ‘live’ performance was one of the unexpected highlights from last year's London Jazz Festival. As you might expect from Manfred Eicher's label the mood was ethereal and enigmatic and Lovano's playing was fresh and engaging. The new one is a less intense joint collaboration with the ex-Tomasz Stańko-mentored Marcin Wasilewski trio and has its moments shifting elegantly through abstract contemporary classical, Slavic folk melancholy and modal-to-free bop idioms. The opener is little more than a gentle caress: the watery ripple of Wasilewski's tension-release harmonies on his self-penned opener ‘Glimmer of Hope’ puts Lovano in melancholic mood; his fragile yearning tone is as unexcitable as it's possible for him to be. The only cover Carla Bley's ‘Vashkar’ is played with a spacey, free bop-ish ebb and flow with Lovano providing the intrigue with his artful note selections and rhythmic placements. ‘Cadenza’ is a more abstract communal improv revolving at first around a sparse conversation between Lovano's curling tenor and Slawomir Kurkiewicz' warmly succinct bass before Wasilewski's meditative soliloquy starts its ascent from the bass end of the piano. Elsewhere the pianist's ‘Fading Sorrow’ captures a light at the end of a tunnel with its wistfully optimistic sax theme. Although it's a less demanding recording than last year's Trio Tapestry, the ensemble dialogue is always exquisite.