Everyone has their own favourite landmarks in the Jan Garbarek catalogue, from the pungent neo-Americanism of the early Afric Pepperbird to the more recent collaborations with the early music vocal group the Hilliard Ensemble. Along the way, Garbarek has explored the folk music of his native Norway, the Aeolian harp and much else besides, but the common thread is his own peculiarly phraseless saxophone style, which seems to deal in extended structural arcs rather than conventional jazz licks. Drawing as it does upon non-jazz aesthetics, Garbarek's melancholy, elemental sound has almost become a school in itself (even if he is its only member) and on this recording, less rarefied and austere than much of his output and perhaps the most easily returnable-to of his many albums, he deploys this in a variety of contexts. "The Creek", for example, is a beautiful and uplifting folkish melody which nevertheless sits perfectly happily against a backdrop of clicky drums and whooshy pads. Newcomers should certainly start here. --Roger Thomas