John has surrounded himself with virtuoso soloists. Sato crafts melodic statements that brim with beautiful harmonies and rhythmic excitement . . . Lockwood exudes a confidence and charisma that commands your attention. His choice of notes and their placement gets more concise and eloquent; he can speak volumes with a few well-selected notes . . . Nazario is a virtuoso, of course, but he’s never just about technique, there’s a real depth of feeling in his playing . . . His solos come at the beat from all sorts of obtuse angles, breaking it up into small, irregular fragments, yet he never loses the time . . . John sounds especially inspired in this company . . . He never falls back on licks or pet phrases, his thematically unified solos are pure invention . . . In fact, everyone in the band sounds as if they had come with the intent of making seriously joyful music. Thelonious Monk called it lifting the bandstand. The John Stein Quartet calls it Raising the Roof. (Ed Hazell, from the liner notes)

John Stein, guitar; Koichi Sato, keyboards; John Lockwood, acoustic bass; Zé Eduardo Nazario, drums and percussion.