The co-leaders, both respected soloists and bandleaders in their own right, have come together to play music inspired by the collaboration on record of Paul Desmond and Gerry Mulligan. Rather than go for straight replications, they have reprised several pieces employed by their celebrated predecessors but with fresh variations, rearranged another and added two originals by Biscoe, including the title track. The overall effect is remarkably pleasing, these two players settling into a very harmonious association, their approaches clearly influenced by their chosen exemplars but without any hint of parody or pastiche. Their lines interweave, quite sinuously, the added support from Oxley (on four of the seven tracks) adding substance, as Brown and Butterfield link in without any grandstanding at all. ‘Then and Now’ feels more like a Tristano-based exercise, restrained and evocative, the theme quite insistent, the voicing eminently pleasing, Biscoe soloing in warm fashion, Oxley following ahead of Neale's light touch. Oxley's extended solo on ‘Easy Living’ only serves to emphasise just how valuable a player he is. The same goes for all the participants: small in scale perhaps, theirs is music that reaches the parts that other forms, more brash perhaps, simply don't.