As a new talent with a fresh sound, altoist Sabattini makes an ideal subject for this label. His alto–sax tone is attractive, being not only clean, lyrical and passionate but also bang in tune, a rare virtue among cutting-edge players. Think of a latter–day Paul Desmond. You'd also expect excellent chops from someone working in such fast New York company: pianist Parks and guitarist Moreno lead their own groups and drummer Calvaire records with the likes of Richard Bona, Sean Jones and David Liebman. Sabattini does flex his technical muscles but admirably sparingly. On one track he matches guest star Chris Potter's rapid–fire tenor lick for lick, but elsewhere is less interested in spitting out thousands of notes than in writing and playing tuneful originals to be developed thoughtfully at gentle tempos. Indeed he should be taken seriously as a composer. His nine originals here all have a dreamlike melodic ‘rightness’ to them and a grow–on–you quality. As a point of reference it's also good to have at least one standard on the set-list and ‘Body & Soul’, tastefully performed here with slight chordal refurbishment, is one of the best.