Green's Blues is the first CD in pianist Benny Green's already distinguished career to feature an entire programme of solo piano. That genre offers nowhere to hide, but Green has the necessary chops, imagination and power to render academic the dangers of embarrassing exposure--not for nothing is he Oscar Peterson's official protégé. The 12 tracks abound in melodious and swinging enterprise, and despite a suitably contemporary harmonic sophistication there's a delightfully old-fashioned feel to much of the music. Green eschews the kind of emphasis on rhapsodic, freewheeling exploration that characterises the solo performances of Tyner, Jarrett and Bill Evans, centring his attention instead on the classic patterns of stride and boogie-woogie. His efforts are as convincing as affectionate, and they are notably inventive too: his reading of Garner's "Misty" owes nothing to the composer, while "I Got It Bad" is a nobly individual version of Ellington's incomparable lament. The CD is on the short side at 52 minutes, and a severe critic might add that it will prove but a minor footnote in the literature of solo piano jazz. Maybe so, but that matters little when there is so much pleasure and fine playing on offer. --Richard Palmer