I first heard Keith Jarrett on the recommendation of Patrick Moraz. Moraz had just replaced Rick Wakeman in the prog-rock band Yes and I was anxiously learning all I could about this relatively unknown keyboardist. Moraz said in an interview in Melody Maker magazine that one of his biggest influences was another (to me) unknown keyboardist, Keith Jarrett.
I tore down to Harmony House Records (Detroit, where we lived in 1976) and bought a double white album with Jarrett’s picture on the cover. Back home again I put the first disk on my parents hi-fi. The Koln Concert. Listening to a rather long piano intro, I patiently waited for the band to join in, or maybe some synths to start winding up. (This was 1976, after all)
…piano, piano, more piano…I grabbed the record jacket to look for a listing of band personnel, or a listing of keyboards used. No band, just Jarrett, no synths, just a slightly ratty sounding Steinway. To my horror, I realized that I had just purchased, and was actually listening to… a solo piano record. Let me make this long story a little shorter. Two months later I was lying flat on my back between the speakers listening to the Koln Concert for hours at a time. (Mr. Boldt, Grade 11 Geography, now you know where I was all those periods.) In fact, I just listened to The Koln Concert again today, 30 years later while digging in my garden. No voice, no drums, no synths, just a player and a piano.
I’m still fascinated with technology- wacky inventions, computers, synthesizers, bells and whistles- all kinds. It’s taken almost 30 years, but I’ve come to see that the piano, when it comes right down to it, is just a big machine. A very solid and refined one, but a machine, nonetheless. I often tell my electronic music students that if you scuffle your feet across a carpet and touch a PC there’s a good chance you’ll scramble it’s nimble but fragile little brains, rendering it useless for a while. I tell them, if you want truly advanced technology, buy a piano. It’s been refined for 300 years and won’t stop working because of a little static electricity.
Keith Jarrett continues to be an outspoken proponent of acoustic music. Whether it’s digging ever deeper with his jazz standards trio, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=io1o1Hwpo8Y&mode=related&search=
interpreting classical repertoire from Bach to Shostakovich, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NL9aEdOT_6s&mode=related&search=
(the critics were smacking their lips waiting to rip Jarrett to shreds, only to eventually admit that he is a profound interpreter of this repertoire), or if he’s playing extended solo piano improvisations like The Koln Concert,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPqK1JJOFxw&mode=related&search=
Jarrett’s output is staggering. Confession- the 10 disk Sun-Bear Concerts were released in 1978. Jarrett has added to his body of work at such an astonishing rate that I’ve only gotten through 8 of the 10 disks. Embarrassing, but Jarrett can produce music faster than I’m able to even listen to, or absorb.
Prickly, joyous, morose, obtuse, heartbreaking…thrilling.
