Craig Taborn

Pound for pound, it’s hard to find a pair of improvising pianists better matched in profound creativity, technical mastery, and pioneering spirit than Kris Davis and Craig Taborn. Between them, they’ve netted two awards from the Doris Duke Foundation, three Downbeat Critics Choice awards, and amassed a list of performing credits that includes such artists as Dave Holland, John Zorn, Bill Frisell, Chris Potter, Terri Lyne Carrington, and Tyshawn Sorey. Davis and Taborn first discovered their musical chemistry while recording Davis’s acclaimed 2016 album Duopoly. That encounter, which Davis described as feeling “like a conversation we’d been having for years,” launched a string of successful tour dates and the acclaimed 2018 duo album Octopus, which the Village Voice hailed as “simply beautiful music.” In this performance, the two dynamic pianists reprise their duologue, weaving pianistic tapestries that range from vivid and propulsive to staggeringly ethereal. Drawing from a wellspring of creativity, they perform rich, layered improvisations on compositions by Carla Bley, Sun Ra, and original selections from their own catalogs.