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There are also two performers on a new Métier CD with the title “In Two Minds,” but the duality here goes deeper, since the same duo of Edward Cowie and Laura Chislett that performs the eight works on the disc also created them. The two call themselves “Duo Menurida,” the second word being the Latin family name of the Australian lyrebird. And that bit of exotic esotericism is only one element of this joint venture. The pieces heard on the disc reflect both composer/performers’ interests in nature in Cowie’s homeland of Great Britain and Chislett’s of Australia. All the works are improvisatory excursions into a shared mindspace that is accessible only in broad terms to an audience beyond Cowie and Chislett themselves. The pieces’ titles reflect inspirations of greater or lesser specificity: Pre Dawn and Dawn—Australian Bell Birds; Guten Morgan [sic], Herr Kandinsky! (Point and Line to Plane); Boom Time-Bitterns at Leighton Moss; New York-New York Mark Rothko-Jackson Pollock; Ornitharia (Flute Solo); Stonehenge Thunderstorm and Skylark (Solo Piano); Lake Eacham Blue; and Dusk / Night Lyrebirds.Familiarity with the specific wildlife and specific artists referenced in the titles is a requirement for reasonably full appreciation of the music, although even then, it is simply not possible for non-participants in these creation-performances to plumb the depths of the artists’ intents and feelings. It is possible simply to enjoy the various sounds of flute and piano throughout the CD – the amusing pointillism of the Kandinsky exploration, the foghorn-like evocation of bitterns, the dynamic thunderstorm impression associated with Stonehenge, and so on. Still, 55 minutes of this collaboration is a bit much, and many of the various evocations are somewhat imprecise unless, of course, one is thoroughly familiar with the inspirations and the artists’ conceptual worlds. It is hard to see this (+++) disc as being more than a self-involved, self-proclamatory bit of self-aware self-advocacy offered to a wider audience without a strong expectation that it will be fully accepted and appreciated by anyone other than Cowie and Chislett themselves. The primary thing that is evoked here is the sense that the “two minds” of Cowie and Chislett are kindred spirits in some important ways with which a wider group of potential listeners is not and cannot be fully conversant.