Dolphy Live Underlined!!! documents Italian reed player Marco Colonna and British pianist Alexander Hawkins’ live performances of Eric Dolphy compositions (plus Billie Holiday and Arthur Herzog Jr.’s iconic «God Bless the Child», following their debut duo hommage to the great master, Dolphy Underlined (Fundacja Słuchaj!, 2020), which was also recorded live in Rome in 2020. The album was recorded at Schoke Flügel & Pianos in Köln during the Multiphonics Festival in October 2020, sixty years after Dolphy’s untimely death, with Hawkins playing on a beautiful sounding Bösendorfer grand piano.

Colonna and Hawkins choose an economic approach, playing only the bass clarinet and the piano. The album begins with the same four of Dolphy’s compositions that were covered on Dolphy Underlined – «Miss Ann is Out to Lunch» (matched into one composition), «Straight Up And Down» and «Something Sweet Something Tender». Hawkins’ piano solo on «Serene» and Colonna’s bass clarinet solo of «God Bless the Child» are simply sublime, touching the deep roots of the blues. They closed this live set with a bluesy, dramatic version of «245» just as they did on Dolphy Underlined.
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The atmosphere is chamber and intimate, unhurried and melancholic in a deep, bluesy manner. It is faithful to the unpredictable and unorthodox dynamics and logic of Dolphy’s compositional ideas and lets these ideas shine and blossom. At the same time, these dynamics highlight the deep affinity of Colonna and Hawkins and their thoughtful, always-searching musical personalities.

Colonna and Hawkins knew how to employ the distinct acoustics of the space and the attentive audience for their profound and poetic interplay. It is always a joy to explore Dolphy’s timeless, idiosyncratic harmonic and melodic ideas again and from a different and fresh perspective, but much more so when such true masters dive into them and make them their own.

Eyal Hareuveni

Marco Colonna (bass Clarinet), Alexander Hawkins (piano)