An intriguing bandleader debut from Israeli pianist, composer and arranger Mor, whose background stints as a military paratrooper and a Microsoft engineer are listed, perhaps for reasons of full disclosure, on the album's press release. Still in Israel, he led his own trio and quartet and played in the Israeli Big Band and wrote music for theatrical productions.

This selection of music was written in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and New York, where Mor upped sticks thanks to a merit scholarship that saw him attend the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music and develop a sound inspired by Israeli multiculturalism and his Middle Eastern roots.

Back in Israel, Mor has performed with the likes of Avishai Cohen and Esperanza Spalding and collaborated with oud player/guitarist Amos Hoffman, who shines on the evocative, spacious ‘Echo Song’ – a folk song made famous by Israeli singer Arik Lavi, Sprinkled among the 11 tracks are standards including Kurt Weill's ‘Speak Low’ and Hoagy Carmichael's ‘The Nearness of You, captured live.

Originals include the swinging, bopping title track and propulsive first single ‘Jerusalem Mezcla’, an ode to the city's Mahne Yehuda market that sees piano lines weaving, tumbling and repeating through heavy bass, crashing drums and soaring, calming oud, Sensitively, imaginatively rendered stuff – and a testament to the transformative power of jazz.