Paul Desmond's style, tone and conception on alto saxophone remain unique in jazz to this day. In his time he seemed to be swimming against the tide of Charlie Parker imitators, so naturally critics berated him for being decidedly unhip, but today he has the last laugh. His style, with his infectious yet easy going swing (everything about Desmond was easy going) and his gift for spontaneous melodic invention has turned out to be timeless. Desmond was able to spin endlessly interesting and intriguing improvised lines that in their melodic construction were almost poetic, however, this approach to improvising is something jazz educators find difficult to teach, preferring instead a pattern based methodology to negotiate harmonic progressions (this is because the great majority of jazz educators have themselves been taught to approach improvisation in this way). Consequently, Desmond is not a player who pops up on the radar of young players these days, and once again his posthumous style is running counter to contemporary trends, but he is a musician who rewards careful study. Desmond was famously a member of the Dave Brubeck Quartet (another group the critics tried to stab to death with their pens) and he had a gentleman's agreement with Brubeck that when recording under his own name, he would not record with a piano (although he did record with electric piano on the CTI label). It meant that guitarist Jim Hall became a regular partner on a series of albums for RCA Victor and this session here on Warner Bros, a date that uses 50% of the Modern Jazz Quartet in Percy Heath and Connie Kay. All the attributes of Desmond's style are captured in this 24 bit Japanese remastered reissue, which also highlights Hall's eloquent guitar playing that has influenced subsequent generations of guitar players such as Pat Metheny and John Scofield. Desmond had already collaborated with Gerry Mulligan on the Verve label (1957’s Blues in Time) prior to Two of a Mind, recorded in 1962 for RCA Victor. Nine of the tracks are with just bass and drums that prompt comparisons with Mulligan's legendary quartet recordings for Pacific Jazz with Chet Baker since both Desmond and Baker operate within the same sonic range. With that in mind, Essential Jazz Classics obligingly include a bonus track of ‘All the Things You Are’, recorded live at the Haig, Los Angeles in 1953, with Mulligan and Baker for comparison with Desmond and Mulligan's version of the tune that opens the album. In fact, Desmond and Mulligan are together more inventive than the Mulligan/Baker combination, especially their command of improvised counterpoint. It is one of those rare pairings dreamed up by record producers that actually work – their version of ‘The Way You Look Tonight’ as compelling in its own way as Desmond's classic version of the song on Jazz at Oberlin with Dave Brubeck.