TITLE: Mosaic: A Celebration of Blue Note Records (Blue Note)

ARTIST:The Blue Note 7 featuring: Peter Bernstein, Bill Charlap, Ravi Coltrane, Lewis Nash, Nicholas Payton, Peter Washington and Steve Wilson.

STARS: 4 out of 5 Stars

SOUNDS LIKE: Updated versions of a few Blue Note Records hard bop classics.

Blue Note Records celebrates both the 70th anniversary of the label and its 1984 re-launch by releasing "Mosaic: A Celebration of Blue Note Records." In homage to the world's longest running jazz label, some of Blue Note's current stable of musicians were asked to re-envision the hits of Herbie Hancock, Cedar Walton, Bobby Hutcherson and other seminal artists.

Gladly the revisions are subtle and not too jarringly different. All eight tunes here remain true and recognizable to the originals in both improvisation and melody.

Saxophonist Ravi Coltrane, along with trumpeter Nicholas Payton leads this group of young lions aptly named The Blue Note 7. Rounding out the all star septet are: Pianist Bill Charlap, saxophonist, flutist Steve Wilson, guitarist Peter Bernstein, bassist Peter Washington and drummer Lewis Nash.

The CD starts out with the title tune "Mosaic," an original song by the stylishly sophisticated hard bop pianist, Cedar Walton. The only thing missing form the original in this upbeat and fiery introduction piece is Curtis Fuller's swirling trombone.

Bassist Washington kicks off Joe Henderson's "Inner Urge" with a creeping one note at a time bass beat that builds up to the orchestral heralding of Payton's grooving trumpet.

Wilson reinterprets Bobby Hutcherson's light playful "Little B's Poem" with some pretty sweet flute poetics of his own.

Coltrane adds some tenor brightness to "Dolphin Dance," Herbie Hancock's subdued early 1960s shuffle.

Overall, these new players do justice to the updating the originals. And they don't take the easy way out by using sampling and hip hop arrangements. That to me take a lot of creativity in itself.