Three heavyweights of British creative music come together on a satisfying live session at the adventurous London venue, Cafe OTO. Given their vast collective experience, which includes work with Evan Parker, Courtney Pine and Alexander Hawkins among others, as well as leadership of their own groups, it comes as no surprise that the result is impressive.

Mitchell has been making his own genre over the years, a kind of music that is as eclectic as virtuosic and he is arguably not as readily perceived as an avant-garde artist to the same extent as the other band members here. Having said that, his ability is entirely suited to a more malleable structural context such as this. Rooted in the guiding principle of reflex action and conversation there are as many pirouettes of tempo, attack and texture on this live session as one might expect from a gathering of such strong individual personalities.

Indeed, the moments of tantalising interplay, in which Charles’s brawny arco is caught by the buzz-hiss-crack of Sanders’ cymbal or Mitchell’s sly hammering of strings, have a substantial sensory charge. The same can be said of the full eruptions of energy, as interestingly, Sanders, for all his skill in rubato situations, brings a torrid funk to the performance at times, making him an unheralded groovemeister in disguise.

But then again, how these players may be perceived is artfully questioned by what they do here, for in the unrestrained spontaneity of this work there is a wide spectrum of mood. Think dark, light; dance; calm; aggression; tenderness. Ballads come through the maelstrom with an elegant sensitivity that would definitely move the single petal of the grand Duke’s rose. The Flame is really about more than the colour red. The music flickers and fires.