Nothing fuels the creative impulses like the art of discovery. A new chord voicing can unlock a door to a different world, and different rhythmic permutations can prove to be an endless source of inspiration, but discovering these things and utilizing them to good effect are two different things. Few artists can see the world through the eyes of the uninitiated while writing with the intellect of the musical elite, but pianist Josh Nelson is one of them.

On Discoveries, Nelson taps into his inner child to find inspiration through the works of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, but the pianist's music doesn't come off like a reflection of these authors' retro-futurist tendencies. Nelson's writing is modern, in the here-and-now, and crafted with a broad harmonic vocabulary that helps to create a rich musical m��lange to fire the imagination. His ability to build intricate, interlocking motifs, while simultaneously painting broad swaths of complex colors in swirling fashion makes him a man with few equals.

While Nelson's music parallels or resembles the work of certain composers at various times, no single influence or style eclipses his own personal, musical ideology. "Dirigibles" features some melt-the-heart bass clarinet work from