Perhaps best known as keyboard player with smooth jazz super-group (the) Rippingtons, Bill Heller has just released his own solo collection, the excellent ‘Find The Way’. It fuses together jazz of varying complexions through the combined talents of guest performers (and Rippingtons band-mates) Jeff Kashiwa, Rico Belled and Dave Karasony plus fine work from Eric Marienthal Ronnie Gutierrez, Joel Rosenblatt and Dave Anderson. However, that said, this is very much Heller’s album. He writes all twelve tracks, produces throughout and, with his mastery on keys, leaves listeners wondering why it has taken him so long to move center stage.
Indeed it was back in 1998 that Heller made his first Rippingtons appearance. That was for the ‘Topaz’ CD and he has been performing live with the band since March of 2001. By that time Jeff Kashiwa was already a regular member of the line-up and with ‘Find The Way’ it is Kashiwa who helps get the show on the road with tremendous sax and flute for the opening ‘Guaraldi’. This mellifluous song has an aura of the Rippingtons about it and much the same can be said of the fabulous ‘Afrikaan’ that is right up there with the best that ‘Find The Way’ has to offer.
Kashiwa is also around to lend a hand on the smoothly accessible ‘Down & Loaded’ while elsewhere ‘Alone’ is a reflective gem that with Rosenblatt on drums and Anderson on bass plays out in true jazz trio style. To say the track oozes sophistication would be an understatement and much the same can be said of both the intricate ‘Blackbird On A Fence’ (that is brought to life by the combined talents of Heller, Kashiwa, Rosenblatt and Anderson) and the wonderful title cut that proves to be a sublime slice of ‘smooth jazz for grown-ups’.
‘5 for 1’ is a jazzy little number where Heller and sax-man Eric Marienthal collectively work some magic and they do it all over again to add retro sparkle to the already shimmering ‘Bill’s Bop’.
Later, Heller’s superb playing for the zesty ‘Latinesque’ is enriched by fulsome horns from Carl Fischer and Luis Bonilla yet although ‘My Thing’ turns out to be a decidedly infectious piece of jazz fusion; it’s Marienthal’s soaring sax that fits the complex ‘Hanna’ like a glove. The piece is further enriched by an immaculate piano solo from Heller but in the final analysis ‘Find The Way’ can be best summed up as a delightful amalgam of lovely surprises.
In this respect there is none more so than the closing ‘Trottoir du Musette’ that, with Heller on accordion, is evocative in the extreme and, much like the entire CD, is a joy from beginning to end.