Keith @ Koln

Keith Jarrett has just recently become one of my favorite pianists, or should I say one of my favorite musicians, period. Not only has he taken his playing to amazingly great heights (even under the throes of chronic fatigue syndrome); he also has proven his mettle in refusing to be pigeonholed under any specific genre. To be honest, he makes some pretty powerful music which transcends any clear-cut categorizations some folks like to tag on the man (but alas to no avail they fail miserably in so doing).

The Koln Concert is now one of my favorite CDs from Mr. Jarrett & rightly so. First of all, 75% of it came about unplanned - it's spontaneous improvisation at its very best in a live setting. Secondly, it's Keith's biggest-selling CD & one of the best that he ever did all by his lonesome. Truly, from the opening notes of this concert (recorded in January 1975) to the very last, Keith takes off & soars in ways very few pianists have ever been able to do before or since. Third, this album placed Keith in the pantheon of piano greats (think Evans, Tyner, & Hancock when in doubt as to who can kick major tail on the ivories) who never failed to find new ways of surprising the audience & themselves in the process. Finally, The Koln Concert confirmed what Keith could do when left to his own devices: deliver the goods from gospel to Chopin to the aforementioned duders I just brought up a few lines back.

Plenty of legendary stories surround how this concert came about, one of them being that Jarrett got the wrong piano for the gig. In fact, the lower & higher ranges of the piano were pretty weak so he stuck to the middle registers the entire time. And yet, despite the limited capacities he felt his piano held, Keith delivered a winning masterpiece, one which would place his label (ECM) on the musical map for good.

As far as my favorite compositions go, Part 1 is a classic but I'm not going to discount Part 2 at all. In fact, I love this whole album without having to resort to nitpicking what sections of this concert really rule & which ones don't. If there was any solo piano album of Keith Jarrett I could recommend folks to check out, The Koln Concert is the best place to start your collection of Keith Jarrett in general. Not only is it electrifying as can be; it's also beautiful, spontaneous improvisation which is undeniably some of Jarrett's best output to date.