OVER the past 20-plus years, saxophonist Tim Garland has been involved in many and varied musical styles, from Celtic jazz to orchestral composition to fusion to free improvisation to the virtuosic celebrations of keyboard master Chick Corea, and he's applied himself to all of them with a commitment and melodic sensibility that makes his musical voice distinctly recognisable in each endeavour.

This double album captures his wide-ranging output with assurance and an almost palpable joy in creating music, even when it's more reflective. CD One focuses on Garland's expandable small group, Lighthouse, and journeys from the invigorating Uplift! through Yes To This - worthy of Corea himself - and the folk music-detailed Lammas Days to a lovely soprano-piano duet of pop-soul ballad She's Out Of My Life. CD Two pitches Garland with the Northern Sinfonia, his writing integrating jazz soloist and orchestra as an utterly convincing natural entity in a series of pieces that are indeed songlike, their shape and expression requiring no words.

Rob Adams