PHILLIP GREENLIEF/TREVOR DUNN
Phillip Greenlief & Trevor Dunn
Evander, 1996PG/saxophone and flute
TD/bass
"Spontaneous composition with saxophone and bass"
Dimensions of bassist Dunn arise in a program of improvised duets with Greenlief’s reeds. Literate, to say the least, it has an epigram from Samuel Beckett and titles that refer to Mikhail Bulgakov, Andre Breton and Isadore Ducasse. They’re keys to the kinds of demands this duo makes. A First impression of low key music gradually gives way to a sense of quiet intensity with each successive hearing. There’s a concentrated linear development, with evident constructivist thought on every track, and the sense of parts missing, often a difficulty in listening in duo music, never arises. In fact, the duo’s music is so refined, its integrity so distinctive, that it’s easier to say what it isn't. There’s never a sense of the easy effect, the hot lick, or the obvious source; instead, there is an overriding will to form and to direct address. The result is demanding without ever being aggressive.
Stuart Broomer—Cadence Magazine, February 1997