Starting in 1991 with , has maintained two alternating series of albums for his smooth jazz music, releasing five volumes each of and discs titled . That the two series are interchangeable in terms of musical style is a point reinforced by this compilation, which pulls one track each from those ten CDs, adding a couple of new tunes ("The Circle" and "Dancing Lights") up front, as well as one from the 1997 covers disc (a version of the -penned instrumental "Love's Theme" that was a number one hit for in 1974) and a sampler from the remix album . This is not a hits selection; that job has been handled previously for 's music by albums with the words "greatest hits" and "very best of" in the titles. Rather, this album attempts to offer a representative precis of 's music, 1991-2008. Most of the tracks are instrumentals, the tempos taken at loping paces (with occasional pauses), as synthesizer-based instrumental beds support a lead line usually played by a saxophone. There are slight variations. "You May Be Gone" from is the first vocal number, in which a high-tenor male voice sings a lament about a deceased loved one. "You may be gone," he notes, "but you'll never be forgotten," later adding, "I hope somehow this song will get through/To let you know we're still thinking of you." That plural pronoun is justified when children's voices come in reciting testimonials to their departed mother. reveals another of his '70s influences by covering 's 1972 hit "Ventura Highway" from . "Valley of the Harps" from finds the music inching toward more of a laid-back chill style, while "Return of the Rainman" from leans to world music, even including nature sounds of thunder and birds. It seems appropriate to close with the edited medley from , since the track does in miniature what the album does for 's '90s and 2000s catalog in total, sum it up. ~ William Ruhlmann