Keeping Company

Description

Founding members of the group Snarky Puppy, pianist Bill Laurance and bassist Michael League set aside noise and fury for a sublime acoustic and minimal duo made in Europe. Keeping Company captures the essence of over 20 years of close collaboration between two soulmates: pianist Bill Laurance and Michael League on oud and fretless bass. It is, in a way, the antithesis of the Grammy Award-winning group Snarky Puppy, which propelled both of them onto the international stage. In duo, Laurance and League reveal themselves to be masters of atmosphere and dark, shimmering timbres, refined composers with a keen sense of clear and memorable melodies, and improvisers so familiar with each other that it takes only a few notes for them to tell stories together. The album continues the concept of its highly acclaimed predecessor, Where You Wish You Were, released in 2023: influences from across the Mediterranean basin, from North Africa to Southern Europe, along with American folk and jazz, blend into atmospheric and borderless chamber music. Bill Laurance and Michael League developed the ideas for Keeping Company during hours of travel on tour across Europe, performing in some of the continent's most beautiful concert halls.