Two modern giants of the bull fiddle, united in a project of awesome power. Silva's ambitions to write orchestrally have finally been fulfilled. He used MIDI keyboards & old-fashioned acoustic piano to create a body of sound that occupies a mid-territory between Duke Ellington or Charles Mingus & Edgard Varese. The five relatively brief sections might almost be movements in a romantic symphony, were the language & articulation not so unmistakably American. Parker is by now beyond reproach & beyond categorization: but what is surprising is how thoroughly & how completely Silva still thinks/plays like a bass player, even if nowadays his imagination ranges right across the strings & beyond. The good news is that this is just the first release in a sequence featuring a remarkable modern duo.

Together, Silva & Parker play a music that is stunningly decisive & seamless, gorgeous & dramatic. It grooves like a motherfucker, but it's also highflown, strident & abstract. The multilayered textures immediately reference the classical tradition, suggesting two post-tonal orchestras improvising in real time. The musicians grip each other's lines as intimately & passionately as lovers, but the eloquence remains symphonic... If only swinging the classics --or 'jazz' as some call it-- always sounded this succulent.

A Hero's Welcome is a phenomenal meeting. Silva provides orchestral arrangements of massed instruments, midi keyboard work, & some excellent acoustic piano. His genius is on high-beam throughout. Parker responds with a masterful performance on double bass, one of the best he's given on record, & is the diva in Silva's opera, singing his ass off in this dark forest of sound. This record is volume one of their duets, if you can call them that. Really, A Hero's Welcome is more a collision of two spirited orchestra's --Silva's & Parker's. The sound is that big, deep, evocative. This suite in five parts generates reference to & reverence for some many visionary twentieth century artists --Sun Ra, Lutoslawski, Penderecki, Partch, Crumb, Ellington, Coleman, & some bluesman, too-- that it's a fitting performance to close the century.