With most jazz writers, every once in a blue moon, you get a gut feeling about a newcomer to the scene. You can hear something really special. An approach to harmony that is totally different, a rhythmic approach that covers a multitude of bases and a flair for composition that reflects the most advanced modern classical concepts allied with an original approach to jazz. That's how I feel about Cuban pianistcomposer Aruán Ortiz. His first release here – a FSNT date with Antoine Roney and Abraham Burton – was so much more than a conventional two-tenor offering. From there, one discovered an earlier ‘Trio’ on the Ayva Musica label. Recently, he's toured and recorded with Greg Osby and Michael Janisch and is a permanent member of the revitalised Wallace Roney Quintet (check out his current Home on HighNote) and now has a flurry of new releases out including an absolutely brilliant, mainly contemporary classical Sunnyside album, Santiarican Blues Suite and this, the debut recording of his new working unit, which features the relatively rarely heard guitarist from the Steve Coleman band, David Gilmore. Roney's excellent bassist Rashaan Carter (another fine composer) and former Jackie McLean pupil, Eric McPherson, complete the group, which makes music of perpetual motion rather than a conventional theme and solo response routine. In fact this is one of the most arresting and complex collections of music in quite a while. Listen to Aruán's out-of-tempo intro to Hermeto Pascoal's ‘Ginga Carioca’. You'll hear Bud Powell, Andrew Hill, Monk, even Tatum mixed with classical overtones unlike anything you've heard. Ortiz sets out no preconceived patterns, but lets the music speak for itself. The title track, inspired by Bill Evans' ‘Orbit’, is a baffling composition, which never seems to resolve and the treatments of Parker's ‘Ko Ko’ (there's much respect for Bird's version, but hard to recognise it's ‘Cherokee’) and Ornette's ‘WRU’ are totally absorbing. An extremely intense album that requires a lot of listening to, with the slow sections equally impressive, you'll find you relate to different parts of the puzzle every time. But persevere because a major talent will shine through.