While some jazz fans may live in a particular place in the past – say 1961 at the Village Vanguard when Bill Evans recorded at the New York club of clubs – most musicians prefer the present, and none more so than Fred Hersch. It just shouts out from his playing, even though he's back at the Vanguard with all its ghosts (friendly or otherwise), but it's not 1961 any more. There's enough here on these two CDs to keep an attentive listener busy for days on end and still the hugeness of Hersch's achievement would not be charted. It's like diving into the Mariana Trench, as deep as you'll know. For my money the second CD is where all the beautiful little moments ease themselves out and multiply, whether on ‘I Fall in Love Too Easily’ or ‘Sartorial (for Ornette)’; but ‘Softly as In A Morning Sunrise’ near the end of the first disc is just genius as well. A wonderful album, just wonderful.