Although trained in classical music, pianist Lynne Arriale was seduced by jazz in her 20s. Now, for her and her trio, the melody comes first, writes Ray Comiskey

'Finding melodies is the biggest challenge of all," says Lynne Arriale. She was speaking of her engagement with the art and craft of composition, but she might also have been describing her own work as a jazz pianist. As one of the most melodic players around, she's emphatic about the importance and primacy of melody.

It's one of the qualities that distinguishes her in a diverse, high-calibre field. Jazz piano, where abundant technique and acute harmonic knowledge are merely tools to start the job with, is not for the faint-hearted. A penchant for innovation or the radical may help, sooner or later, to attract attention; for the long haul, however, you have to match it with musical substance.

Yet it's more difficult to express individuality by working, as she does, within the accepted conventions of bop and the related elements of post-bop piano. It calls for a patient, diligent refinement of the craft, rather than any grand gestures.

Behind it is the hope or, if you're lucky, the confidence, that you'll find your own voice, as she has done.

En route, she has been often compared to one of the greatest of all jazz pianists, the late Bill Evans, but it's difficult to detect any sign of this in her playing; she has said that her lines were never like his at any stage. In fact, detecting any jazz pianist's influences in her work is hard.

Was this because she was classically trained, didn't go near jazz until she abruptly switched in her 20s, and therefore brought no jazz baggage with her? "Well, actually that might be part of the situation," she agrees, "but when I first started out, the first five years I sounded like I was imitating Cedar Walton - you don't hear that now - and Gene Harris for a while, and then Thelonious Monk a little bit.

"And later Keith Jarrett was an influence, but more than listening and saying, 'Oh, God, what is that?' Because with Keith, I mean, his melodies are so - there's such a purity, he doesn't play clichés. On a conceptual level, he's a great influence because you never hear him doing the same thing. So I thought to myself , 'Oh, my God, that's a whole different way of approaching it'."

Jarrett is notorious for singing as he solos. It can be heard on just about every piano recording he's done; and though Arriale can plead not guilty here, it gave her an idea she has used ever since, even with her students . Convinced the originality of his lines comes from singing, she started singing away from the piano during practice time.

It's not an outlandish idea. In scat singing - wordless, improvised vocals of the great Louis Armstrong and Dizzy Gillespie - the phrases they create are vocal clones of their trumpet playing, stamped with the unique fingerprints of their creative personalities.

"When you sit and sing a solo away from your instrument," she explains, "it cuts through everything you may have practised. Now, you've got to practise, obviously, but when you sing I think it takes you to your unconscious mind much more readily. And then when you play, all of a sudden you're playing things that you didn't even practise - and where does that come from?"

Another huge influence is pianist Richie Beirach, whom she calls a mentor, teacher and friend. "What's been most influential is his explaining to me about motivic development, taking an idea like" - she hums the famous opening to Beethoven's Fifth - "and learning how to develop it.

"And I still continue to work very hard at that, because the motivic continuity, of taking a seed and letting it sprout and grow, and developing it musically, is a tremendous challenge. It's not just about playing like, you know, long lines and lots of licks. It's about telling a story, beginning, middle and end."

Her own musical story began when she was four. Classically trained, she got a degree in piano performance at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music before being suddenly seduced by jazz in her early 20s. And that demanding, show-me-what-you-can-do world sat up and took notice when she won the International Great American Jazz Competition in Jacksonville, Florida 10 years ago.

Although she has worked on various projects since then, her natural home is the piano trio. That seems unlikely to change. She likes its capacity to combine intimacy and flexibility, to have an orchestral sound and yet be capable of quick changes of direction. "The extent to which we stretch the music is just only limited by your own imagination," she says.

Her present trio, formed in 1999 with bassist Jay Anderson and long-time colleague, drummer Steve Davis, is probably her finest yet. She compares it to a relationship that has gone on a long time, where the chemistry is present and the relationship has therefore, inevitably, deepened. So how do they keep staleness at bay? "If you look deeply into the eyes of the person that you love," she answers, expanding on the relationship comparison, "and you just are kind of quiet in your own mind, and just look at them and listen to the sound of their voice, and listen to them speaking and what they're saying, it cannot become stale. If you are truly present with each other I don't think you have to come up with ways of keeping things fresh, because every person on the planet is constantly changing, moving and growing.

"And it's the exact same thing in music. Yes, I bring new material to the group, and we're always adding things, but by the same token, musicians have a way of saying - in fact I've heard Jay and Steve say this about each other - Steve will say, 'yes, Jay is always here to play', and Jay will say the same thing about Steve 'he's always a 100 per cent present and accounted for and right there'.

"In other words, he's not distracted. He is completely at one with the music and tuned in to the other members of the group. It's like we're just locked up. It's like the laser beam just kind of connected us all. And if that happens there's no way it can go stale."

Piano trios with a chemistry like hers have been likened to musical conversations. Typically, she has her own slant on the analogy which, she says, is so often taken to mean a conversation of straightforward statement and response, or question and answer. "It's not like that in our trio, because if we're waiting for the response we're not in the flow of the music.

"I'm going to change the analogy," she adds. "You have three people looking out of a window at a beautiful setting. One person says, 'Oh, my God, these trees are absolutely gorgeous', and another person's saying, 'Yeah, look at those leaves, the beautiful shading of those leaves'.

"Now, they are listening to one another, but also reacting to the scene. These people are actually absorbed in it, so they're kind of hearing the person talk, but they're also just so absorbed in it that they're having their own response at the same time. And there's this kind of cloudy thing going on where you're not just fixated on the object. You're hearing what the other people are saying, peripherally almost, and you're responding to it."

It's a perfect description of the way her own trio - and similarly inclined groups, no matter how radically different they might be in other ways - works. What it doesn't say is the rigorous craft, won the hard way, that supports the chemistry and the creativity.

And Arriale works at it. Apart from her distinctive approach to playing, for her as a composer the melody comes first.

She doesn't fall into the trap - that so many jazz musicians do - of hitting on a chord sequence that might be attractive to improvise over and then finding some kind of original line to lay on top of it to serve as a tune. The pieces that result generally lack real character.

"They couldn't stand alone," she agrees. "However, if you take Wayne Shorter's tunes, or Herbie Hancock's, those are great melodies. They stand alone." So do the originals on her newest album, Arise, which were written in response to 9/11. But we will probably be able to confirm that, and much else besides, when she opens her tour in Dublin next Tuesday.

The Lynne Arriale Trio plays at the Coach House, Dublin Castle, Tuesday March 18th; Sligo, Niland Gallery, March 19th; Drogheda, Droichead Arts Centre, March 20th; Bray, Mermaid Co Wicklow Arts Centre, March 21st; Portlaoise, Dunamaise Arts Centre, March 23rd; Waterford, Garter Lane, March 24th; Cork, Triskel, also workshop, Cork School of Music, March 25th; Galway, Radisson SAS Hotel, March 26th; Limerick, Castletroy Park Hotel, March 27th