Isn’t April supposed to be the cruellest month? That’s how TS Eliot had it, subverting Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales and centuries of jollier associations of the month with earthly and spiritual rebirth after the ardours of winter. For The Seasons, saxophonist/bassoonist/composer Ben Wendel appears to have gone down the Chaucerian route and filled ‘April’ – the fourth track on a 12-cut disc that runs from ‘January’ to ‘December’ – with rejuvenatory pep. Indeed, all the months get a bit of a groove. The project began as a series of chamber duets, released across the course of 2015 in the form of a dozen videos (Wendel’s model was a set of 12 piano compositions by Tchaikovsky; if Tchaikovsky captured the 19th-century zeitgeist by putting his compositions out in a magazine, Wendel was equally of-the-moment by using YouTube as his platform). Wendel’s playing mates included the likes of Julian Lage and Ambrose Akinmusire; for this CD reimagining of the original duets the cast has been expanded – each month gets the quintet treatment – and simultaneously slimmed down – it’s the same five musicians on each track. Still, given who those five are (Wendel, plus Aaron Parks, Gilad Hekselman, Matt Brewer and Eric Harland) we shouldn’t be too upset. Just one question: shouldn’t it really be called The Months?