Low-key, very low-key. It's hard to recall the last time Ronnie Scott's was as quiet as this. The duets by the guitarist Martin Taylor and the Scottish-Canadian singer Alison Burns - no frills, no gimmicks - demand nothing less than your full attention. A world-class improviser, Taylor has acquired plenty of expertise in stripped-down formats. Burns, who happens to be his daughter-in-law, is less well established established, but together they have come up with a genial after-hours album in the form of the newly released 1 AM.

Ella Fitzgerald's collaborations with Joe Pass are one obvious point of comparison. Taylor's playing, though, tends to be more lyrical and less harmonically complex, which has the happy effect of leaving more room for his partner to manoeuvre. Burns has a honeyed and assured voice, and while the material concentrates on conventional songbook standards, she has also written a poignant ballad, True, inspired by the memory of her brother, who was killed in the Falklands conflict.

It was Taylor who took charge in the opening set, supplying most of the anecdotes and cheery patter. Burns, much more reticent, preferred to concentrate on the vocals, offering a sure-footed take on How Long Has This Been Going On? and a suitably offhand treatment of He's a Tramp. Ornamentation was kept to the minimum; Burns trusted the lyrics to do their work. Her unfussy approach also rescued one of Stevie Wonder's schmaltzier tunes, If It's Magic.

If Burns's performances lacked high drama, Taylor raised the temperature with a couple of crisply executed solo features evoking memories of another guitar-vocal duo, Tuck & Patti. Norah Jones's hit Don't Know Why received a forceful makeover. The calypso-like melody of Down at Cocomos was just as appealing, Taylor's dampened strings hinting at the beachcomber aura of steel pans in the twilight.

Editor's choice

• Burning Bush with W
• Revolution at the new Saatchi Gallery
• Boy George on sex, drugs and Amy Winehouse