Carta de AmorECM ****

There must be a basement in Munich stuffed with live recordings by ECM artists yet to be cleared for release by the label's founder, the famously meticulous Manfred Eicher. This gem, which has languished underground since 1981, features the happy convergence of three distinct voices: free jazz pioneer Charlie Haden, Scandinavian wailer Jan Garbarek and Brazilian polyglot Egberto Gismonti. The tunes are mostly Gismonti's, the musical direction was coming from Haden, and the voice soaring over it all is the incomparable Garbarek. Few musicians can pull off "sweet" with as little toe-curling as Garbarek, and his disarmingly simple melodies, rooted in folk music, are as pure and crystalline now as they must have seemed 30 years ago. ecmrecords.com