Sangam

The chamber music duo of sitarist Paul Livingstone and cellist Pete Jacobson, aka Sangam, have a new album of the same name which means ‘A Confluence of Rivers’ in Sanskrit. It's a place where disparate streams flow into one, appropriately describing the blend between two musicians performing innovative compositions and improvisations straddling Indian classical (a strictly monophonic melodic system) with European harmonies and melodic counterpoints.

This approach works beautifully particularly on track two, ‘Duality’ (in ‘Raga Yaman’), one of the longer of eight tracks on this album leaving one feeling as though cello might be the most natural home for this evening raga. But track four, ‘Playas’, stands out as an intriguing composition in which both musicians come into their own. Livingstone, who began studying music in India while still a teenager, is recognised as a serious proponent of North Indian classical raga music. He was also one of very few Americans to train with the late sitar legend Ravi Shankar, whose musical influence is very clearly audible in Livingstone's style. Jacobson is a Grammy award-winning musician and a frequent performer with the San Diego Symphony while his solo cello can be heard on several film and TV soundtracks. This is a noteworthy album where both musicians focus mainly on the North Indian style of music with some unexpected twists.