Malija - The Day I Had Everything: Folky, melodically strong chamber music

Malija is a new group made up of old friends, each of whom has exerted an influence on the London scene to which they belong.

Saxophonist Mark Lockheart of Loose Tubes and Polar Bear fame, pianist Liam Noble who plays with Irish singer Christine Tobin, and bassist Jasper Høiby of the influential piano trio Phronesis represent a formidable alliance of musical talent, but mercifully, they don’t seem disposed to prove it.

Here are three musicians who have been there and played that, and now have the self-assurance and lack of musical hubris to go looking for the sounds they really like: folky, melodically strong chamber music, with flavours ranging from bluegrass to tango to contemporary classical, that veers from the carefully written to the liberally improvised.