In 1967, Swedish altoist
Arne Domnérus started leading a septet featuring some of his country's top jazz artists. In 1996 the group had a recorded reunion featuring the surviving players plus a few worthy successors. For this live set, the music is often comprised of jazz interpretations of folk songs along with a few originals. Sometimes sounding a bit like
Duke Ellington or
Charles Mingus and other times hinting at classical music, the ensembles are quite musical and the solos are mostly pretty distinctive with trumpeter
Bosse Broberg being particularly expressive and altoist-clarinetist
Domnérus and tenor saxophonist
Lennart Aberg creating plenty of rewarding statements. The concluding "Adventures in Jazz and Folklore" is quite a tour de force, a 25-minute work by the late pianist
Jan Johansson that uses seven different folk melodies in a jazz setting. Overall, this is a CD that rewards repeated listenings. ~ Scott Yanow