To borrow a phrase from Duke Ellington, Lynne Arriale's music is "beyond category". There's a lot of jazz in it, along with pristine classical technique, but finally it expresses her unique self. Some of her compositions here, Will O' the Wisp and The Dove especially, are so simple, delicate and touching that one wonders why she waited all this time before making her first solo album. Others among these 12 pieces are, by turns, playful, intense and even song-like, but don't look for crunchy, stompy swing, à la Stan Tracey, even in Thelonious Monk tunes, because that's not her way.