Jan Lundgren and Yamandu Costa’s mix of genuine rapport, mutual respect, and impressive musicianship has created an album that is set to become one of the great piano-and-guitar recordings.
ACT Music
Jan Lundgren – Piano; Yamandu Costa – Guitar
Jazz piano and guitar duos are not that common, but some of them really stand out, like Jim Hall & Bill Evans’ UNDERCURRENT, or Pat Metheny & Brad Mehldau’s METHENY/MEHLDAU, Pat Martino and Gil Goldstein’s WE’LL BE TOGETHER AGAIN, and Peter Leitch with John Hicks’s DUALITY. It’s cool to see that this duo format isn’t just limited to North America. Swedish pianist Jan Lundgren and Brazilian guitarist Yamandu Costa showed this with their debut album INNER SPIRITS.
Pairing a guitar and a piano can be tricky because both instruments handle chords and complex harmonies. Without careful balance, they can clash and create dissonance. Plus, with its broader dynamic range, the piano can easily overpower an acoustic guitar.
Lundgren and Costa first crossed paths in Malmo, Sweden in 2019. Lundgren invited Costa to perform at a festival he hosted in Ystad, Sweden. In 2023, they gave their first concert together, and in 2024, they recorded INNER SPIRITS with Andreas Brandis as producer and Rainer Maillard as engineer.
Costa has carved out his own unique style on the Brazilian 7-string classical guitar, blending the traditional sounds of southern Brazil with Samba and Choro. His playing combines fast, intricate runs with delicate, melodic passages.
Jan Lundgren has been a key figure in European jazz over the past two decades, especially through his work with Paolo Fresu and Richard Galliano in the Mare Nostrum trio. He has worked with almost all of the important Swedish musicians and with many international artists, such as Mark Murphy, Harry Allen, Lee Konitz and Stacey Kent.
INNER SPIRITS captures the remarkable way these two musicians blend their shared love of melody, effortlessly shifting roles from lead to supporting voice in a way that feels completely natural.
INNER SPIRITS was playing when I had friends over for dinner, and everyone said how lovely the music was. It is ideal as background music, but if you take a closer listen, you’ll find that what these two are doing is truly mesmerizing.
Costa strums the lowest string on his guitar, introducing ‘Para Aprender A Amar,’ an Ecuadorian pasillo. Lundgren mirrors Costa, mimicking the strumming pattern on the keys, making the piano sound as if it’s strumming along with the guitar.
While Lundgren and Costa composed the majority of INNER SPIRITS, there are several covers. Antonio Carlos Jobim’s ‘Garoto’ is a Brazilian gem, and their version of Luis Bonfa’s ‘Manhã De Carnaval’ is one of the prettiest I’ve ever heard.
The titles of Lundgren’s compositions reveal how personal this album is. He dedicates tracks to his Mare Nostrum partners, Paolo Fresu and Richard Galliano, as well as to his wife, singer Hannah Swenson. In ‘Hannah,’ the piece begins gently before the tempo builds, with Lundgren’s piano delivering a beautiful melody while Costa’s classical fingerpicking mirrors the fluidity and rhythmic complexity of a jazz guitarist.
Jan Lundgren and Yamandu Costa’s mix of genuine rapport, mutual respect, and impressive musicianship has created an album that is set to become one of the great piano-and-guitar recordings.
