“This Love” is the first recording by the new duo of Kaja Draksler and Susana Santos Silva, and is set to delight audiences old and new and add to the critical acclaim that has greeted both musicians individually since they came to public attention just a few short years ago.

Of Slovenian origin, but based now in Amsterdam, Draksler joins a list of notable modern female pianists that include Eve Risser, Sophie Agnel, Kris Davis and Angelica Sanchez. Combining classical and jazz motifs, elements from the traditional music of her country and the study of the inner structures of Cecil Taylor’s improvisations, Draksler is a captivating and adventurous player, brimming with ideas and as exciting to behold for the nuances of detail in her playing as for her strong feeling for rhythm.

Active in both the mainstream and the avant-garde scenes in Portugal, trumpeter Susana Santos Silva confirms here, in a more intimate context, everything she brought to the band Lama (which featured Chris Speed and Joachim Badenhorst as special guests), namely, her warm, tightly focused, lyrical and yet highly geometrical style.

To those who have followed these two musicians in the various configurations in which they have performed, there was probably a certain inevitability to their coming together as a duo, and now that it has finally happened the resulting album is as satisfying as anyone could have wished. This is a document of creativity at its highest level, capturing the duo communing back and forth between composition and improvisation, the flow so organic that one could be forgiven for forgetting that it takes musicians of exceptional ability, sensitivity and inventiveness to make music like this sound so effortlessly natural.

Tracks 1 and 6 by Kaja Draksler and Susana Santos Silva, 2 and 5 by Kaja Draksler, 3 and 4 by Susana Santos Silva

Recorded at Culturgest on the 22nd of March 2015 by Luís Delgado / Mixed and Mastered by Luís Delgado
Produced by Kaja Draksler and Susana Santos Silva / Executive Production by Pedro Costa for Trem Azul / Design and artwork by Travassos / Inlay photo by Petra Cvelbar