Clarinet & Piano: Selected Works, Vol. 2

Whereas their first record was put together over an intense three-day period in a hired-out studio, Vol. 2 saw the pair having to work around various pandemic lockdowns. This meant taking over Jones’ living room, where they gradually put its ten tracks together between September last year until March of this. They would record one or two songs over a couple of days then pause for the week, building and ruminating on ideas; it allowed the music take on a more ambitious nature – albeit within the chosen pairing of piano and clarinet – but also took in all the bits of chat, traffic noise and other creaks and squeaks of a home recording.

Taken as a whole, there’s a gorgeous ambience to the record but that shouldn’t be confused for Volume 2 being an ambient listen. The organic understanding that Black and Jones have of each other’s processes as musicians means that the music sounds incredibly fluid, but the overall tranquillity of the record is made up of dozens of small nuances. It’s a puzzle that’s been put together just below the surface as the duo react with a warm emotion to the songs they’ve chosen.

It’s in the way that Group Listening are able to prod, probe and contort the self-defined parameters that they’ve set themselves that makes Clarinet and Piano: Selected Works Vol.2 such an intriguing listen – and it’s the love and care they’ve taken over it that makes these versions entirely their own.