Candlelight: Love in the Time of Cholera

“Body and Soul”

(Saranac)

The piano-and-violin team of Pete Malinverni & Juliet Kurtzman partially reference the name of a much-adored Gabriel García Márquez classic for their recording Candlelight — Love in the Time of Cholera (Saranac). Alluding to the undying passion of true love that drives the literary classic, as well as the COVID-19 lockdown conditions under which the album was created, the duo dives into an intimate set of music that includes a few numbers by Bix Beiderbecke, dips into the songbooks of Astor Piazzolla and Scott Joplin, and spotlights a couple of pianist Malinverni’s compositions, as well. The pair also revisit the romantic standard “Body and Soul,” a song that saxophonist Coleman Hawkins made his own with his definitive 1939 rendition. Malinverni sets an appropriately candlelit ambience, which Kurtzman matches with her piquant bowing. The violinist also recreates Hawkins’ legendary solo, splitting the difference between classical preparation and jazz expression.