Jasmine ECM ****

The fact that Keith Jarrett and Charlie Haden haven’t recorded together since the mid-1970s, during the last days of Jarrett’s American Quartet with Haden, Paul Motian and the late Dewey Redman, would be enough to make this duo album an event in itself. But there is also the superior quality of what came from this informal few days of lovely music-making at Jarrett’s home studio in 2007.

Although Jarrett did make some duets with Haden for the bassist's 1976 Closenessalbums, the pianist has rarely recorded as part of a duo. Haden, on the other hand, has made some exceptional duo albums; several are with pianists, the finest of which are those with Chris Anderson, John Taylor, Kenny Barron and Hank Jones. If Jasmineis not quite at the top with the Taylor and Anderson albums, it still deserves a place in that company. This much is clear from the music, which has a laid-back, late-night feel, when emotions are close to the surface and unabashed romanticism has free rein.

In choosing from the Great American Songbook, Jarrett and Haden went for love songs to reinforce the mood; noir Jasmineis not. In lesser hands it would be self-indulgent, but there's a rigour behind the lyric imagination displayed by both players, along with a mutual respect and desire to serve the music, that makes for some exquisitely seamless performances.

In the finest pieces – the gorgeous ballads For All We Know, Where Can I Go Without You, I'm Gonna Laugh You Right Out of My Lifeand Body and Soul(the latter and No Moon at Allare the only ones to rise above ballad tempo) – the explorations expand and amplify the mood while remaining totally sympathetic to it. And Jarrett has the ability, time and again, to make the eventual return to the original theme sound like a summation of the journey completed.

Even when the duo hew closely to the original material (on the sombre majesty of Goodbye and the delicate sketch of Don't Ever Leave Me), there is a sense of great players with power in reserve – and the judgment not to use it. See classical.ie