The collective trio Thumbscrew (guitarist Mary Halvorson, bassist Michael Formanek, drummer Tomas Fujiwara) followed up their 2018 paired releases Ours and Theirs — one album of new compositions, one album of covers — with a set of nine pieces by saxophonist and composer Anthony Braxton, with whom each of them had either studied or performed. They chose material that had either never been recorded or had been recorded only once or twice, and developed their own arrangements based on the scores, which were sometimes heavily notated, other times abstract graphic diagrams. One piece, “Composition No. 14,” appears three times; each member of the group takes a run at it solo. The tunes all have a distinctly Braxtonian feel and vibe, full of leaps and quick, squiggly passage, but the players put a spin on the music in its composer’s absence that they might never have done within one of his ensembles, making it both his and theirs at once.

– Phil Freeman