Requiem for a DreamerCamJazz * * * *

The late Kurt Vonnegut's work inspired these pieces by pianist John Taylor, who leads a quartet with Julian Argüelles (soprano/tenor), Palle Danielsson (bass) and Martin France (drums) through some compellingly persuasive collective and individual responses to them. And if it's tempting to align, say, the shifts of Unstuck in Timeand Billy Pilgrim's temporal dislocations in the novel Cat's Cradle, or the surreal opiate of Calypso 53and the religious satire it represents in that novel, the music, more relatively orthodox than perhaps expected, can stand alone. Taylor's compositions have substance and character. and this exceptional quartet make them their own. Typical of their rapport and imagination is the Taylor/Argüelles dialogue on Somebody I Used to Beand So It Goesand the contrasting laments – one delicate, the other visceral – of the eponymous bookend tracks. See CamJazz.com