JASPER COUNTY
Trisha Yearwood
MCA Nashville

Trisha Yearwood has been one of Nashville's premier songbirds for nearly 15 years, always distinctive among a crowd of big-voiced wailers for her reliable balance of power and character. Her approach is unchanged on her first album in more than four years. "Jasper County" is an assortment of well-chosen tunes that showcase the Georgia native's strengths and survey a variety of stylistic niches.

Yearwood's voice is elegant and rich with emotive spirit - relaxed but still sufficiently precise to fill out the mellow "Trying To Love You." She gets loose and feisty amid the hammered piano of the rambunctious honky-tonk tune "Pistol," and her clear tone meshes pleasantly with the bright energy of guest Ronnie Dunn alongside the whining pedal steel guitar of "Try Me."

Her singing is almost too crisp to smolder with the sizzling electric guitar on "Sweet Love," but the assertiveness with which she handles lyrics serves her well there and on such perky fare as "Baby Don't You Let Go." New challenges are few within such safe territory as the reflective, wistful "Georgia Rain," but her range is wide enough that she travels in a number of interesting directions even when confined to a comfort zone.

- THOMAS KINTNER