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They’ve been one of the longest running jazz groups ever: Keith Jarrett on piano, Gary Peacock on bass, and Jack DeJohnette on drums. The trio first played together in a one-off studio session for Peacock’s 1977 album Tales of Another. A few years later, Jarrett recruited the other two for a standards session, a surprising move given the propensity of all three for playing new music. Jarrett’s aim was to reconnect with the “tribal language” of jazz and to investigate the “non-possessive” side of music making. Apart from a couple of studio visits, the trio has mostly worked live, and significantly, they don’t use arrangements. Arrangements can be possessive of course - “This is how we play this tune, this is what we do with that one” - so the trio lets each song begin, develop, and end as it may. Following on from that, the setlists are also constructed in real time. More and more free playing creeps into their albums over the years, sometimes in tune-related vamps, sometimes in stand-alone spontaneous creations. I still think of them as the “Standards” trio, though, as they’ve never abandoned the old songbooks.
A few years ago, I used to be so gung-ho about this group that every album seemed essential. However, as their catalog has continued to swell, I’ve grown more discerning about what’s a great title and what isn’t. They’ve never made a bad album, but some are a lot more desirable and/or unique than others.
These two volumes emerged from the same session, and it’s amazing that the trio could sound so advanced right off the bat. Their pent-up traditional feeling is so sophisticated that one could imagine the trio secretly having been playing standards together for five years. Jarrett is melodically effusive as always and he incorporates a lot of bop twists into his vocabulary. Gary Peacock updates the Scott LaFaro style of contrapuntal bass. Jack DeJohnette drums exquisitely, especially when using brushes. Apart from some walking bass lines, the trio mostly plays around the pulse instead of stating it. The level of rhythmic trust is high. Because it’s a studio session, it has a more insular feel than the many live albums to follow. The trio basically has an eloquent discussion amongst themselves. Volume 1 boasts a moody “Meaning of the Blues” and a quiet look at “It Never Entered My Mind”. The extended “God Bless the Child” rides a slow backbeat that connects to Jarrett’s gospel-funk of the preceding decade. Volume 2 is an even stronger selection, including wonderful versions of “Moon and Sand” and “Never Let Me Go”. Jarrett’s long-lined solo in “In Love In Vain” betrays a need to play standards, not just a desire, and joy bursts out of the midtempo “If I Should Lose You”, where even Gary lets out a whoop. Jarrett’s slick original “So Tender” matches the feel of the standards and the playing is again excellent.
Praise dispatched, I now must issue a warning: Jarrett’s nasally vocal accompaniment is on display. Maybe because of the studio miking setup, it’s more distracting than usual when it occurs. It doesn’t hamper every track or every moment of the afflicted tracks, but it requires fair warning. Otherwise, I would not hold back from saying these discs are must-owns for any fan of the piano-trio format.
The chemistry of the first studio session also produced a couple of quarter-hour free improvisations, “Flying Part One” and “Flying Part Two”, presented here. Without song templates, the music is obviously more abstract yet the close conversational level remains. Every gesture made by the three players is out in the open and determines where the music goes. There are too many elements to describe, but in a nutshell, “Flying Part One” broods and “Flying Part Two” dances. Both are like large tapestries waving in the wind, and none of the trio’s future free improvs sound anything like these. Jarrett’s vocalizing, for whatever reason, is hardly as intrusive as on the above standards volumes. So that’s a plus.
Changes also contains a superb version of Jarrett’s “Prism”, a tune conceived for the European quartet and which sounds just as good in the hands of the trio. Peacock and Jarrett slither around the mysterious melody, and DeJohnette deploys a light, swishing pulse under the solos. All three tracks definitely make Changes worth acquiring.
In the live context, the swing becomes clearer, the solos stretch out, and the process is more direct. This six-song CD is a great introduction to the trio’s approach. Even though I prefer some of their later recordings, I still enjoy going back to this one and hearing how refined the group was from the start. They always raise the curtain well: the opening “Stella by Starlight” begins with a solo piano rumination and brews a head of romance as Gary and Jack lock in. The peak tracks are “Falling in Love with Love”, bright and hard swinging, and “Too Young To Go Steady”, driven by DeJohnette’s unbreakable cymbal pulse. DeJohnette also wows the crowd with his “Way You Look Tonight” solo. Jarrett plays inspired solos and it’s pretty clear already that the standards aren’t just a temporary diversion, they’re his new jazz home.
Things go to a new level on this two-disc Munich concert. The trio maintains their excellence with individual tunes (“Come Rain or Come Shine”, “Autumn Leaves”, “Billie’s Bounce”) and they also introduce spontaneous vamps and extensions to the proceedings. For example, in the middle of the second disc, they’re blazing through “You and the Night and the Music”, then Peacock’s bass solo quiets down to nothing but pulse. Jarrett offers new chords, DeJohnette adjusts the momentum, and before long, the trio is adrift in the unknown. This segment has the continuum feel of Jarrett’s solo concerts, but it’s not like he forces that identity onto the table. The improv continues until Jarrett shifts gears and finds his way to “Someday My Prince Will Come”, which takes off in a new direction. An interesting transition, to say the least. Meanwhile, the four tunes on Disc 1 are about the finest sequence the trio ever recorded. The evocative piano chassis that carries “My Funny Valentine” disallows any of the usual surface prettiness given the song. Next is an energetic jaunt through “Autumn Leaves”, which spawns a tight vamp at the end. The atmosphere softens for “When I Fall in Love”, and then comes the seventeen-minute centerpiece “The Song is You”, the ultimate trio track to my ears. Jarrett introduces it with a oscillating keyboard pattern and only brings in the happy melody once the pulse is established. Jarrett then launches an ecstatic solo, and Peacock and DeJohnette have wild exchanges afterward. On the final theme statement, the momentum is so titanic that it’s clear that the band is not going to stop and couldn’t if they wanted to. It’d be like entering your driveway at 65 miles an hour - the house had better get out of the way. And so the final melody phrase leads right into a grooving two-chord vamp. Major and minor harmonies create a pregnant feel, with a hot rhythm underneath. The group rises and falls in the vamp’s grip, eventually landing on the piano figures that Jarrett used to start the piece, including flitting remnants of “The Song is You” melody. To be able to tap into something so powerful, and to have the awareness to frame it like that, is awe-inspiring.
What else? Um, Desmond’s “Late Lament” is done well, too. A terrific album all the way around.
No tunes here, just four lulling vamp-improvs, hence the title. Each comes from a different American concert. “Dancing” is the most active piece, while the other three are more subdued and trance-like. Hypnotic as the music is, the trio pays close attention, rather than zoning out. For pure listening pleasure, the soft piano caresses of “Endless” are very beautiful. The mix hides the bass and drums in a reverbed space behind the piano, which would be unacceptable for “real” tunes, but for this ambient scenario, it sounds nice. That being said, these tracks will likely bore the socks off those who require standard melodies and changes. I’ve always liked the album, even though it’s a little too reserved. I’m curious what effect and place the individual pieces had in their original concerts.
Not released until a few years later, this concert is undistinguished enough to make one wonder why it was pulled from the cupboard. It shares some of the same material as Tribute and The Cure but the Norway versions aren’t noticeably better, and neither is there any extended free improv to open things up. There is fun to be had in “Love is a Many Splendored Thing” (the main highlight) and a reverent “Old Folks”, but in no way does the disc steal the shine from the trio’s better recordings. And the cloudy concert hall sound is disappointing. When a jazz group is up and running, you don’t want to feel like they’re a hundred feet away from you.
So named for each of the individual songs being dedicated (on the album cover, after the fact) to various jazz giants - “All of You” for Miles, “Just in Time” for Bird, “Solar” for Bill Evans, etc. A nice gesture, but it doesn’t hide the unevenness of the concert. Disc 1 takes a while to get going: “Lover Man” never ignites, and DeJohnette’s explosive drum breaks in “I Hear a Rhapsody” seem intended to wake the group up. The decent “Solar” leads into a vamp extension called “Sun Prayer”, although the trio sounds like they’re drowning in it, and not in a good way.
The second disc is better for refined ballads like “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” and “It’s Easy to Remember”. The glittering piano intro to “All the Things You Are” is impressive and “Just in Time” burns so hard as to inspire a second solo from Jarrett at the end, but therein lies another problem - the whiny vocals are back. Every medium or fast tempo tune is laden with obnoxious humming, louder than on any of the other concert recordings. If Tribute was already precariously balanced, Jarrett’s habit tips the scale in the negative direction. For completists only. And by the way, the original “U-Dance” is a very trite ditty.
Recorded live at NYC’s Town Hall, this is the most satisfying program since Still Live. It’s not perfect - the 13-minute “Body and Soul” is too ponderous - yet a friendly, bluesy vibe permeates most of the tracks. Monk’s “Bemsha Swing” is transformed via Jarrett’s soulful swirls and a floating pulse, while “Old Folks” and “Blame It on My Youth” sound lush. “Woody ‘n You” swings easily. The original title track is built on a minor pentatonic bassline, a chord riff, and a sly DeJohnette backbeat, all of which lights Jarrett’s flame for a few minutes. The show ends with a humble and somewhat tipsy “Things Ain’t What They Used To Be” that gains much crowd approval. When Keith’s got the blues, everyone goes home happy. Solid album, except I’ve never quite cracked this “Body and Soul”.
This six disc box presents one set each from three nights at the Blue Note in New York. It’s the trio’s Sun Bear and their masterwork, in my opinion, and it’s been near the top of my desert island list ever since I first heard it. Jarrett, Peacock, and DeJohnette are each in top form on a wide range of material, and the recording brings us closer to the instruments (and thus the music) than ever before. Beyond the keystrokes, the string plucks, and every detailed touch of the drumkit, we can hear the communication between the players and also the attention of the audience. The concert hall formality of some of the other records is nice, but the Blue Note tapes seal the argument for visceral proximity. Tunewise, the collection is like a mini Real Book. Pages like “Days of Wine and Roses”, “Alone Together”, and “You’d Be So Nice to Come Home To” sit alongside familiar trio staples like “Autumn Leaves” and “When I Fall in Love”. “La Valse Bleue” is a rare waltz number. A few Jarrett originals pop up: “No Lonely Nights” is a pleasant ballad, and “Partners” sounds like Jarrett rearranging a few Charlie Parker lines into a new tune, hence the writing credit to both men. The catchy “Bop-Be” fits in with all the older tunes. “Partners” and “No Lonely Nights” are heard in two versions each, and the only other repeated title is Mercer Ellington’s “Things Ain’t What They Used To Be”, which closes two of the evenings. Performances range from straightahead swing (“If I Were a Bell”, “How About You”) to ballad stillness (“Imagination”, “For Heaven’s Sake”). Even better are the mountainous dynamics of things like “How Deep Is the Ocean” and “Time after Time”, where the trio takes their time building up and coming down. Each night begins with a marathon piece that turns into a vamp extension: “In Your Own Sweet Way”, “Autumn Leaves”, and “On Green Dolphin Street” all put the trio in the groove zone. “Green Dolphin Street” has a lovely riffing intro, too. A couple of the ballads (“I Fall in Love Too Easily” and “You Don’t Know What Love Is”) also turn into subdued vamps. Totally improvised, the final set’s “Desert Sun” is a long, exotic, minimalist groove in the style of Changeless or some of Keith’s solo concerts. Jarrett develops the tunes with a lot of patience and creates magnificent solos. His mischievous side is heard in the set-ending blues tunes like “Now’s the Time” and “Straight No Chaser”. DeJohnette is terrific in both the uptempo swingers and the ballads. His soft-tom drumming in “You Don’t Know What Love Is” inspires the “Muezzin” vamp that follows it. And Gary Peacock really shines on this box. It’s not like he was ever a marginal element of the trio, but his bass is further to the front this time, and he takes a lot of excellent solos as well.
It is difficult to single out a few favorites, because so much of it is so good, but I think the opening “In Your Own Sweet Way” represents all the swing and grit and effervescence of the engagement. Another charming moment appears in the very last track, “How About You”. After five minutes or so of swinging bliss, the trio falls out of sync in the final bars and the tune comes to an anticlimactic halt. The audience giggles in semi-shock, confronted by the trio’s sudden fallibility. Judging by the audience reaction, the band is probably all smiles, too. Keith re-starts the final cadence, Gary and Jack lock in, and the audience laughs/cheers again as they realize that the players are going to concentrate and get it right this time, which they do. And so ends the gig on a note of amusing humanity.
The most delicate of the bunch gives the impression that the slightest breeze would scatter the likes of “Mona Lisa” and “My Funny Valentine” to the wind. Ditto the hushed revisiting of “Never Let Me Go”. Strength arrives in Powell’s “John’s Abbey”, and “Autumn Leaves” proves a trusty standby for Jarrett. The jam that concludes a joyous “I’ll Remember April” is a bit ditzy, though. After the full monty of the Blue Note dates, the Tokyo concert is another experience altogether, and the band plays more preciously than ever. Jarrett registers well in the mix, while Peacock sounds like he’s still backstage. Not a front line entry.
Bebop lives! This two-disc Paris concert features mostly bop-oriented material like “Bouncing with Bud”, “Groovin’ High”, “Sandu”, “Conception”, and “Hallucinations”. Jarrett seamlessly works vintage licks into his own style, while Peacock and DeJohnette plow straight ahead. Both “Round Midnight” and Ahmad Jamal’s classic “Poinciana” make belated appearances in the repertoire, and the latter really fits the trio’s sound. Benny Golson’s title track is taken on a relaxed, masterful ride. “Chelsea Bridge”, “Prelude to a Kiss”, and “All My Tomorrows” provide soothing ballad relief, and the perennial “When I Fall in Love” closes the concert. Jarrett might deny it, but I’m sure he’s got Bill Evans’ Portrait in Jazz somewhere in his closet. Along with all the Bud Powell records he says he’s never heard.
The centerpiece “What Is This Thing Called Love” is founded on a dancing vamp and goes into a long piano solo where Jarrett’s right hand, as usual, is much more active than his left. The angular diversion after the bass solo could have turned into a separate extension, but Jarrett cuts it short and returns to the song. Another highlight is “Groovin’ High”, which exists between the bookends of an infectious piano riff. All in all, a vibrant album.
In which the group rediscovers free improvisation - four of the five tracks (all recorded live in London) are totally off the cuff. The first two tracks together run about 40 minutes, and both tread a lot of vague ground before reaching their respective payoffs. “From the Body” uncovers a distilled melodicism in its final stretch, while “Inside Out” morphs into a heady blues crawl and mires itself deep in jazz’s most primal emotional state. The grandeur of these two tracks is a little strange; I don’t think either improv could have occurred in a small room. The next two tracks are more immediate. With lockstep comping and clipped lines, Jarrett builds on Peacock’s bass syncopations on “341 Free Fade”, an intriguing 18-minute abstraction. Then the abstruse “Riot” fades in with Jarrett accenting the whole range of the piano over a staggering DeJohnette rhythm. Tense and fun. Perversely or not, the disc ends with the trio’s fourth recorded version of “When I Fall in Love”, and the best compliment I can pay is that I don’t care if it’s the fourth or twentieth version, because it sounds lovely. Heck, it’s the best yet. Overall, Inside Out is a bit patchy, but the good parts win out.
The booklet to Inside Out promised more free improv in the future and here it is: two discs of free playing recorded live in Tokyo. Being a fan of both the trio and free improv, and having been excited by the better moments on Inside Out, I don’t think I ever anticipated any of their albums as much as this one - and neither was I so disappointed. Problem #1: both discs open with half-hour pieces that are almost complete wastes of time. “Hearts in Space” (Disc 1) flounders about with no real communication, no motifs or points of interest, and no direction whatsoever. Two-thirds of the way through, Jarrett introduces a ballad idea that dissipates rather quickly, and then the trio ends up in a pointless time-no-changes swing. Disc 2’s “Waves” has a few pleasant moments but the vast majority of it is equally aimless, and at times, Jarrett drops out to let the other two carry on with no musical premises having been established. Towards the very end, you can hear how disconnected the trio is: Jarrett cheesily winds up an inane melody he had been playing for the previous few minutes, yet Peacock and DeJohnette keep chugging along as if they weren’t even listening to Jarrett in the first place. It’s all a disgrace to the trio, and I have no idea why the artist and producer thought this stuff needed to see release. Problem #2: both discs end with questionable tracks, though they don’t go on as long. “Paradox” and “Relay” both start with Jarrett laying out brisk melodies that imply a specific tempo, so bass and drums duly fall in line and it’s like the trio is kind of playing songs, but not really playing songs. In other words, actual free improv is ruled out by melody and tempo, yet there are no chords to guide anything so the solos and basslines just wind along aimlessly. And the “Relay” melody would have been too insipid for Jarrett at age 10, let alone when he’s a tribal elder leading one of the world’s greatest jazz groups. DeJohnette erupts with a powerful solo in the midst of “Relay” - because there’s nothing else to do - after which Jarrett returns with that ridiculous singsong theme. Awful. Having written off the majority of the album, what’s left? Four tracks that would make a fine single disc. For one, the brief piano solo “The River” is one of the most beautiful things Jarrett has ever played, no exaggeration, and in three minutes it has more depth than the above four tracks put together. The meditative groove “Tributaries” would have fit on Changeless, and “Facing East”, after a drum explosion, becomes a bright march. The best track is “Tsunami”, a long stretch of rough-housing in which DeJohnette again rises to the fore and plays a thunderous drum episode. “Tsunami” has enough fire to crush both “Hearts in Space” and “Waves” in one blow.
Sorry folks, I have to call it like I hear it (after giving it many chances), and the main tracks are major chinks in the trio’s artistic armor. Always Let Me Go makes Inside Out sound that much better, yet the real antidote lies in 1983’s Changes, when the trio’s free playing had much more intrigue.
This double disc set, recorded live at Montreux, was released in 2007 to commemorate the trio’s 25-year anniversary. According to the liners, Jarrett thought this particular show captured the group at its best. A lot of the evidence backs him up. In fact, listening to the first cut on the way home from the record store, I couldn’t help laughing in appreciation of how engaged these players can be within tunes we thought we’d heard the final word on. Any thoughts of “here comes another Standards Trio album, same old same old” were quickly obliterated. The show begins with “Four”, and I think you’d have to go back to Sonny Rollins’ RCA Victor years to find another version so adventurous yet so on top of the swinging beat. This tune happens to be perfect for Jarrett’s ability to stretch phrases in any direction, and to carry momentum from one chorus to the next. Towards the end, Jack DeJohnette takes exciting drum breaks, as he does on many tunes throughout the set. “Four” is followed by the title track, once rendered so delicately by Bill Evans, here expanded into a more linear journey. Certainly Evans is a touchstone for Jarrett’s trio work, but the difference between the former’s heady harmonies and the latter’s elastic single-note lines is clear. Next up are a charging “Oleo” and a cool “What’s New” that I enjoy quite a bit. “The Song Is You” burns along and segues into the same vamp that the trio had explored to such great effect on Still Live. In this case, though, the vamp tapers into silence relatively quickly. Closing out the first disc, the trio tackles Waller’s “Ain’t Misbehavin’” in stride style, but as Jarrett mentions in his notes, the performance doesn’t sound “old” at all. Perhaps it’s the subtle swing accents that lay across the ragtime beat, or maybe it’s just the enthusiasm with which the group revitalizes this ancient tune. Gary Peacock almost steals the show with a particular lick in his bass solo. Disc 2 resumes with two more numbers in rag/stride style, including another highlight in “Honeysuckle Rose”, the piano solo of which is fantastic. Playing all three of these ‘retrofitted’ pieces together might make them sound a little too similar, but if you listen to any of them individually, it’s amazing how the trio can dig deep into jazz history yet sound so fresh in the process. Regardless, the next tune “Straight No Chaser” takes a sharp left turn into abstraction, countered by a polite take on Gerry Mulligan’s “Five Brothers”. “Guess I’ll Hang My Tears Out to Dry”, though pleasant, is not among the trio’s more mysterious ballads, while “On Green Dolphin Street” provides an energetic climax to the set. “Only the Lonely” serves as a light encore.
Minus the wavering directions of the second disc, I think My Foolish Heart as at least as good as anything the trio has released since the 1994 Blue Note recordings, and tracks like “Four”, “Honeysuckle Rose”, and even the oddball “Straight No Chaser” are definitely unique. The recording is great, too. So don’t write this one off until you give it a fair listen.
As with some of the other titles, this concert wasn’t released until a few years after it was recorded, and after Up For It had already seen release. What’s with the leapfrog? Whatever the case, the trio puts forth yet another fresh selection of standards. Specialties include a very lovely solo piano reading of “It’s All in the Game” and the 20-minute improvised blues of the title track. Unfortunately, that blues goes through ten minutes of cheekiness before it reaches the right-on moments. The rest of the set features some fine Jarrett solos (“I Love You”), and the quiet “You’ve Changed” is nice. Speaking of, the whole disc is kind of quiet; the bass and drums are lowered in the pristine but hardly equal mix. Yes, I appreciate the recreation of room ambience, but (I’ve already said this) why make the bass and drums sound off in the distance?
Live in Juan-les-Pins. Admittedly, there are no surprises, no extensions to the general process, and only two of the tunes (“Scrapple from the Apple” and “Two Degrees East”) are new to the group’s recorded history. However, the art of this trio is still a delight. Their organic flow renews the appeal of moratorium-begging songs like “My Funny Valentine” and “Someday My Prince Will Come”, both of which contain outstanding piano solos. (They’ve never done “Valentine” the same way twice; this one builds up to a very graceful swing.) Jarrett still finds much reward in standard chord changes, like “Scrapple” and “If I Were a Bell”, and in “Butch and Butch”, he makes a rare detour into quartal tension a la Tyner or Corea. (DeJohnette, meanwhile, creates metric tension early in “Scrapple”.) A head of steam builds throughout the concert, culminating in the funky vamp that emerges from yet another “Autumn Leaves”.
The idiomatic genetics of bop and blues are embedded deep in the workings of all three players, while their collective sound is still innocent after all the years of experience. In other words, these guys know better to be clever; all they offer is improvisational honesty.
Punter's Synopsis Fine Introductions: Up For It, Standards Live, My Foolish Heart Pinnacles: Live at the Blue Note box, Still Live, Changes Excellent second tier: Whisper Not, The Cure, Inside Out After those: Depends on how much you love Jarrett, really.
What about Bye Bye Blackbird (1991)? I just never liked it as much as most other people seem to.
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