At a time when more musicians are trying to be heard than ever before, rare gems like Samuel Blaser seem paradoxically, rise above it all. Since his 2007 debut as a leader, 7th Heaven (Between the Lines), Blaser has grown at an almost incomprehensible rate, from a straight-ahead hard bopper in his mid-twenties to an innovative free player and ever-searching composer and bandleader in his early thirties - one whose improvisational strength has received high praise from the media world over.