Two contrasting sides of the trumpeter-composer that are linked by creative slight of hand and conceptual audacity. Performing the music of Thelonious Monk is a challenge for any group, but arguably even more so for a sole exponent of a single note brass instrument, such is the effectiveness with which melody, harmony and rhythm interlock in those ingenious Rubik’s Cube compositions. By stripping the source material down to the bare essentials Smith cleverly shows just how much beauty there is in a Monk theme, and how best to frame it with silence and the finest of margins on hesitation, anticipation and tonal manipulation. When he mutes, sustains or trills it is done so to fully serve the narrative arc, and the careful blend of sober mid-register legato and hard-edged allegro lines that cleave to and cut free from the originals make for an absorbing listen. As for Najwa, it sees Smith in a group that features guitarist Henry Kaiser, which may well raise expectations of another installment of their electric Miles project. While there are echoes thereof the main focus here is the vast sonic possibilities of the guitar, with recognition of its centrifugal role in the history of the blues and western pop. Michael Gregory Jackson, Brandon Ross and Lamar Smith are, along with Kaiser, astute choices of six-string adventurers, primarily because they all adopt such idiosyncratic approaches that fall largely outside of the standard lexicon of the instrument. The chords sometimes have a haunted, icy austerity as well as fiery intensity that combusts in the inherent drama of Smith’s commanding long tones. Which works well against the dark funk of a rhythm section well marshalled by the steady percolation of Pheeroan akLaff’s drums and the post-Bootsy slide and slither of Bill Laswell’s bass. The ensemble performance is thrilling for its alternation of tonal density and thematic clarity, but it is the moments when Smith is alone, with the intimacy of the blues and a few vapour trails of guitar, that are memorable. Between them Meditations On Monk and Najwa, for their unremitting daring and discipline, show Wadada Leo Smith to be a musician who is at the absolute peak of his powers.