There has only been one Erroll Garner in jazz. His style was so distinctive that anybody even thinking of basking in its influence would immediately be branded a copyist. And besides, the joyful élan with which he played could never be imitated because it went to the very core of the artist – it was so profound that it is almost impossible to listen to a Garner performance and not end up with a smile on your face. He communicated joy – the joy of playing, the joy of living, the joy of improvising and the joy of bringing his exuberant brand of jazz to the world. Thus it is a joy – that word again – to listen to what is effectively the first new Garner studio album in 25 years – a collection of 14 previously unreleased tracks including six originals from the man who penned one of the most enduring ballads in jazz, ‘Misty’. The album begins with a 12-bar blues, ‘High Wire’ with a funky bass-line that's surely going to be sampled to death; it was a tune Garner included in his concerts in the early 1970s and here, with Mangual's loping conga beat, there's cause for wonder why it never got released at the time – which is the subtext of this whole album. Another blues, ‘Down Wylie Avenue’, is revealing of how he could create a solo on this most basic of forms that could seem to grow into something special. On standards he was equally beguiling – his versions of ‘Stella By Starlight’, ‘Caravan’, ‘Night and Day’ and ‘I Want to be Happy’ capturing the essence of his art with his left-of-centre introductions that have you wondering where it's all leading, before the dramatic exposition of the song's theme is then joyfully deconstructed and put back together again before your very eyes.