Some five decades after Rollins showed that the trio, as opposed to the quartet, can be one of the most effective vehicles for the saxophone a musician steps up to the plate in very assured fashion. On alto, rather than tenor, Niescier plays with a fire and fury and above all intelligence, capturing the imagination of all during this gig at last year’ s Berliner Festspiele, which earned her the prestigious Albert Mangelsdorff Prize. The explosiveness of her attack, the Dolphy-esque flurry of ideas, the precise intonation and the ability to compose in order to skillfully expand the palette of the pared-down setting to imply grandeur as well as intimacy, are excellent, as on the engrossing overture of ‘Like Sheep, Looking Up’ where Tordini's needling arco and Niescier's unsettling, piercing mid-range harks stoke a grippingly fraught ambience that evolves into lyricism teased over the slightest forward rhythmic drive. When Niescier chooses to attack the wide open spaces left by Sorey, whose restraint is such that a tap on the ride cymbal takes on the dramatic charge of a sigh in the middle of familial conflict, she does so with real focus on the underlying narrative. If that piece is a highlight then elsewhere there is the kind of tough, tightly-gripped funk that freewheels into brilliant boiling rubato. Impressive music that makes a case for greater exposure of a trio standing tall in the lineage of fine Euro-American bands.