Hitting the note

`The word can be tossed around until people don't know what it means." So says Canadian pianist Renee Rosnes of jazz, her chosen form. Now 37, she's been playing the music for over 20 years and studied classical piano and violin too. Regarded as one of the finest modern jazz pianists, she knows what she's on about.

Renee - the name is short for and sounds like Irene - tells a story about a visit to a hairdresser in New York, where she lives. The woman with the scissors asks her what she does for a living and, when told, says: "Oh, I just love jazz." But she doesn't really. She's referring to Celine Dion, the pop balladeer whose music is commonly described by US radio stations as "smooth jazz".

"Smooth" it may be - if smooth is bland - but jazz it ain't. Renee accepts the difficulty. "If you ask five people what the music is, you'll get five totally different answers," she says.

Jolly in conversation, when she plays, she's tight. Very tight. Weaves through the tunes with a sense of melodic and rhythmic neatness that sounds serene, her best aspect perhaps. She hits edgy intensity too and works back again to the quieter stuff, making full use of the register. Every note fits. Every chord. There's no wastage. "I really try and make sure everyone knows the road map of the tune."

Next Saturday, Renee plays a double bill at Vicar Street with New York singer Stacey Kent. Those attending can expect to hear a range of diverse influences.

On Art & Soul, her fifth work on the prestigious Blue Note label, she plays a couple of her own compositions and pieces by masters such as Duke Ellington and Wayne Shorter, with whom she has recorded. Renee might never have heard these, and other jazz players, were it not for an inspirational high school teacher in Vancouver, who first nudged her towards the music, which was "another world" at first.

But her outlook is not blinkered. On the same record, she does a sublime version of a Children's Song by the Hungarian classical composer, Bela Bartok - like a dream, it hangs in the mind for hours.

She does a Beatles piece too, albeit almost by accident. "I was actually just messing around on the piano. It was somewhere just in my brain. `What is this?' It took me some time to figure out what I was playing." With a Little Help from my Friends was the tune, her treatment of it suggestive of the essence of jazz: work on the melodies and find the chords, the secret chords, the implicit harmonies. Every melody hides its own potential. Finding it is jazz.

Speaking by telephone from her home, Renee cites "a spirit of empathetic musical kinship" with her fellow band members, bassist Scott Colley and drummer Billy Drummond, who's also her husband. "I think the chemistry has to be there to start with. From the experience of playing together, you develop a trust between you and maybe stretch it out a little. It's a comfortable conversation between old friends, say, different from people who are just meeting each other."

Spontaneity is crucial, even when recording. "Generally speaking, unless there's a really glaring error, we go for the first or second takes. When you get to three improvisations, it's really not fresh anymore."

Yes, Renee sees herself as part of the greater jazz tradition, stretching back through the years - no, she's not obsessed by it, although she has recorded with such noted figures as Herbie Hancock and the saxophonist Joe Henderson. As well as playing, she listens a lot to the music and writes also, though not as much as she would like.

OF New York, Renee says the scene has changed since she arrived there 12 years ago. "It's still healthy, but there were a lot more jazz sessions, a lot more camaraderie between musicians." She laments the closure of some of her favourite jazz clubs and in her own time the city has seen the death of major figures such as Art Blakey and Dizzie Gillespie. "That training ground (for young musicians) is not there anymore."

Overall the process is one of continual improvement. "I think it's a life process being an artist. When you stop developing, you stop being a serious player." Although reflection offers "insight and maturity", she sees it as important not to let this get in the way of the music. "The trick is not to have that analytical mind when you're performing, although its hard to turn off that ear when you listen to yourself play."

A busy woman, much of her time is taken with the demands of her 17-monthold son, Dylan, whom she named after the Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas. Only afterwards did she learn that a certain young singer once known as Robert Zimmerman had changed his name to Bob Dylan for the same reason. Does the baby like music? "He's banging away on the piano. He likes to pick out notes. I'm not going to force him. I hope he finds something he's passionate about."

Renee Rosnes plays along with Stacey Kent in Dublin's Vicar Street next Saturday