In which two giants from the Motherland meet on earth, then reconvene remotely. Tony Allen: kit drummer and co-creator of Afrobeat, who taught himself to play by listening to the great American jazz drummers, and whose iconic elder status has made him a hero for young jazz Turks in the UK and beyond; Hugh Masekela: the activist, educator, composer, singer, bandleader, horn player and father of South African jazz.

Having first met in the 1970s, the two men were brought together in London in 2010 by World Circuit producer Nick Gold. Following Masekela’s death in 2018, the unfinished sessions, with their original compositions, might have remained exactly that – but resolve and fortitude saw what Allen calls ‘a South African-Nigerian swing jazz stew’ completed in 2019. The results more than justify the effort. While Allen’s chugging Afro-beat rhythms underpin the album’s eight tracks, the genre’s overly busy polyrhythmic monotony is given new grace by a minimalist approach that sees drums at the centre, with sharp stick work supported by sympathetic percussion and the lightest touches of keys and bass. Masekela vibrates with shouty, bolshie joy on tracks including opener ‘Robbers, Thugs and Muggers (O’Galajani)’ and ‘Never (Lagos Never Gonna Be The Same)’, while that golden flugelhorn – vying beautifully with Steve Williamson’s tenor on ‘ Agbada Bougou’ – stirs, soothes and on ‘Slow Bones’, fades out with a loaded poignancy.