While I have not asked him about this, I wouldn't be surprised at all if the role MP plays is similar to what he did in DT - more that of a creative director - and leaving such things as the business end, the sonic qualities and whatnot to Derek, much as JP handled those things in DT. It would make sense given how things worked in DT, how MP is not interested in the business side of things, how Derek was more responsible for the business end of the ProgNation 2014 at Sea (can't remember where I heard/saw that, but it's not just speculation on my part) and how MP has so much else going on in his life. So is it the end of the world that he's not there to do the recording with the singer? Not at all - at least Derek is with this person, and you can be sure that MP is receiving MP3s of the recordings to comment on and approve.
From my dealings with him in designing the tourbooks, T-shirts, CD artwork and a poster, he is *very* hands on and involved in even minute details, even tho everything was done via e-mail. I'm pretty sure if you asked Blob or BobS (who is heavily involved in post-production/editing of many MP-related videos), they'd tell you the same thing. Given that this is far more involved than what I did, you can be sure that this is nothing like musicians simply recording their performances and Fed-Ex'ing it to the next studio like all those tribute albums were, which it should be noted MP was never a fan of in the first place.