Nādī

Over a series of impressive solo albums, the guitarist Guy Buttery has established himself as a major force in South African music. Recorded in his home town of Durban, Nādī is his first joint album and he could not have found a more empathetic collaborator than the sitar-player Kanada Narahari. They met in 2016 when Buttery was seriously ill with debilitating bouts of fatigue. He consulted Narahari, who is also an Ayurvedic doctor, and who healed him not with medicines but by playing him ragas on his sitar.

Out of the patient-doctor relationship grew a musical friendship that led to the nine rather wonderful, mostly instrumental guitar and sitar duets that make up Nādī, (which is a Sanskrit word that translates as ‘The Channel’ or ‘An Internal River’).

They're joined by tabla player Ronan Skillen, bass player Shane Cooper, Chris Letcher on organ and the synths of Julian Redpath, who add layers of New Age ambience to their shimmering African-Indian inflections. Tandi Ntuli also adds a brilliantly improvised vocal to ‘Sonokota’. Yet in many ways, the best moments come on the two-part ‘Raag Kirwani’ when the sound is stripped down to the simple, stringed magic of the two main protagonists.