Joel Rubin & Uri Caine

I don't know if two albums constitute a trend, but the avant-fusion duo format is two for two this year. Following Ballake Cissoko and Vincent Segal's acoustic remix of Malian music comes clarinettist Joel Rubin and keyboardist Uri Caine to demolish preconceptions of klezmer. Azoy Tsu Tsveyt is totally relatable on a traditional level, but you can't help but marvel at the unceasing invention. Rubin is extremely well versed in religious and colloquial expressions of Jewish music, and his clarinet playing is liquid and lyrical, only provoking questions when the listener starts to analyse his deceptively twisted phrasing. Caine gives one of the bravura keyboard performances of the year; he sticks mostly to the electric piano, with a little bit of Hammond organ. Stylistically, he swirls Fats Waller's stride into Chick Corea's galactic dissonance and garnishes that with a touch of 12-tone madness. Nothing is played tongue-in-cheek, but the ground covered ranges from nu-school Klezmatics covers to traditional Shabbat songs. The peak of the album is "Yiddish Soldier," which is like a klezmer In A Silent Way. This is brilliant and swinging.