Muhal Richard Abrams, George Lewis and Roscoe Mitchell

Contrary to what even a few of its biggest fans believe, when free improvisation is outstanding, it’s never formless. And given the extraordinary amount of ability it takes to conceive, build and sustain a musically coherent narrative on the fly, it’s understandable that vets would excel at it. Mere seconds into Streaming, pianist Muhal Richard Abrams strikes a minor-key descending figure that effortlessly links George Lewis’s trombo-phonic melody with Roscoe Mitchell’s reed punctuations. Even if you weren’t aware that the participants jump-started Chicago’s legendary collective the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), their interplay unfolds with such cohesion and suspense that you know you’re in the presence of masters.

It’s interesting to listen to Streaming with an ear toward the more eccentric quarters of the rock world. Lewis brandishes a laptop for the electroacoustic piece “Bound,” and the glorious, minimalist textures he gets into with Mitchell wouldn’t sound out of place behind a song by TV on the Radio or Animal Collective. And yet, as ace creative musicians (Mitchell also cofounded the Art Ensemble of Chicago), the trio is quite adept at holding your attention with no vocalist in tow. Variety here takes the form of surprising combinations, like Lewis and Abrams’s 18-minute rundown on “Dramaturns,” or the percussion that surfaces amid the low-end thunder on “Soundhear.” Creating form from thin air seems to come naturally to them. — K. Leander Williams