Replacement for a session slated to follow up a 2013 duet with Italian bassist Giovanni Maier and UK pianist Keith Tippett (1947-2020), scotched by pandemic and then Tippet's subsequent death, Two For Keith introduces a new trajectory. It features Maier and another masterful British pianist, Alexander Hawkins.

This homage is reverence not replication however, since besides an association with Louis Moholo-Moholo, who also worked with Tippett, Hawkins, 44, is of a different generation with an individual keyboard approach. Meanwhile the bassist, 63, who has recorded with everyone from the Italian Instabile Orchestra to Taylor Ho Bynum, expresses himself in multiple configurations. Whether Hawkins concentrates on sparking key projections, slow moving pressure or even pivots to the Blues, Maier is instantaneously beside him with arco string stabs or grounded pizzicato stops.

The 13 improvisations aren't one sided though, "Fadograph" for instance begins with jagged string sawing followed by hunting and pecking keyboard clips that connects when the bass line is torqued to an assembly line of hard clanks and clips. Alternately a track like "Swimswamswum" expresses its swing affiliation mating the bassist's rhythmic crunch with the pianist's speedy keyboard slides, then is stalled by Maier's string twangs. Keyboard expositions are either understated and methodical or joyous and energetic, while the bassist's tactics are equally adaptable.

The extended "Whatiff" is the paramount example of this. A compound of thick wallowing bass thumps and pedal point keyboard pressure turns within two minutes into a contrapuntal showdown. Varying among spiccato bass chording and equivalent high pitched staccato keyboard extensions, it fragments into an interlude of dual dissonant sound shards then sweeps down to double bass woody col legno and singular piano chords.

More than making up for the aborted Maier-Tippet session, Two For Keith is fine music on its own as well as a fitting tribute to the departed pianist.