As a virtuoso harmonicist and vibraphonist, Hendrik Meurkens has always reigned supreme in the unique instrument doublers category, yet he never seems to get the attention he fully deserves. The German-born, New York-based Meurkens has been making beautiful and bouncy Brazilian-based music for decades with his instruments of choice, and Live At Bird's Eye is no exception.

For his fourth date on the Zoho label, Meurkens culled nine numbers from two different stints that took place eighteen months apart at the Basel, Switzerland club, but the consistency in sound, personnel, and quality make it seem like all the songs could have been recorded on the same evening. Bossa nova, choro, and samba are the subjects of the day, and Meurkens never fails to amaze in any of these settings. Meurkens-as-composer is covered with the title track from Sambatropolis (Zoho, 2008) and "Lingua De Mosquito," from Amazon River (Blue Toucan, 2005), while the lone American standard—a bossa take on "Body And Soul"—demonstrates his ability to recontextualize oft-covered material to his liking.

On the other two-thirds of the album, Meurkens mingles with his musicians in dwellings built by big-time Brazilian composers, such as