Creation (ECM)
Keith Jarrett
Released May 8, 2015
DownBeat Four-and-a-Half-Star Review
YouTube:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kXIr6wQ65tD2sU9eGoV1b0c5enqpHQJmw
Spotify:
About:
“Creation” signals a departure from the ‘traditions’ of Keith Jarrett’s many ECM recordings of solo improvised piano. Earlier concert recordings have reflected the flow of musical ideas and inspirations as developed in the course of an evening (as on The Köln Concert, Paris Concert, Vienna Concert, Rio etc) or several evenings (Bremen-Lausanne, Sun Bear Concerts, Testament etc.) Creation – drawn from concert recordings made in Japan, Canada and Europe in 2014 – is different.
After reviewing all the music from his 2014 performances, Keith Jarrett honed in on the most revelatory episodes from six concerts in Toronto, Tokyo, Paris and Rome and sequenced them, effectively creating a new concert, a new suite of pieces with its own inner logic and momentum. The concept opens up fresh possibilities, extending the improviser’s art to include an intuitive reassembling of material. The resultant album is perhaps the most strongly lyrical of Jarrett’s recent solo releases, the choice of music emphasizing pieces in which there is a sense of song being born, voices striving to be heard. Creation also offers the most up-to-the minute account of Jarrett’s uncanny capacity to construct compelling music in real-time: his melodic-harmonic imagination as an improviser and his ability to consistently find and shape new forms remain, after all these years of solo concerts, remarkable.
The album begins with music from Toronto. Paul Wells of Canadian national news magazine Maclean’s, reviewed the concert at the Roy Thomson Hall, concluding that “Jarrett matters because he possesses the improviser’s secret to greater degree than almost anyone. He can spin melody and logic, structure and surprise, richly and indefinitely.”
Three of the improvised pieces sequenced here – Part IV, Part VII and Part VIII – are from a concert Jarrett gave at Rome’s Auditorium Parco della Musica on July 11, 2014. Jarrett returns to Italy on May 18, to play a solo concert at Teatro San Carlo in Naples.
Track Listing:
1. Creation, Part I, Toronto – Roy Thomson Hall, June 25, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 08:17
2. Creation, Part II, Tokyo – Kioi Hall, May 9, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 07:40
3. Creation, Part III, Paris – Salle Pleyel, July 4, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 06:59
4. Creation, Part IV, Rome – Auditorium Parco della Musica, July 11, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 07:33
5. Creation, Part V, Tokyo – Kioi Hall, May 9, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 07:13
6. Creation, Part VI, Tokyo – Orchard Hall, May 6, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 09:25
7. Creation, Part VII, Rome – Auditorium Parco della Musica, July 11, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 08:17
8. Creation, Part VIII, Rome – Auditorium Parco della Musica, July 11, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 08:36
9. Creation, Part IX, Tokyo – Orchard Hall, April 30, 2014 (Keith Jarrett) 08:30
Personnel:
Keith Jarrett: piano
Recorded April-July 2014, at Roy Thomson Hall (Canada), Salle Pleyel (France) and Auditorium Parco Della Musica (Italy) by Martin Pearson; Kioi Hall (Japan) and Orchard Hall (Japan) by Ryu Kawashima (Tokyo)
Mixed by Jan Erik Kongshaug, Manfred Eicher
Mastering: Christoph Stickel and Manfred Eicher
Design: Sascha Kleis
Cover painting: Eberhard Ross
Executive producer: Manfred Eicher
Review:
Creation, draws from his more recent solo efforts. One difference in this presentation is that Jarrett takes selections from his improvised solo concerts in Japan, Canada and Europe in April–July 2014 and sequences them non-chronologically. This is an inspired idea: Listening to Köln at home always led to the sense that something was missing, which may have been apparent to audiences that could watch Jarrett touch the stars. Perhaps as a result of the miniature-scaled solo jazz recordings he has put forth, he allows us here to take better note of his profound simplicity, his gift for brushing the clutter aside and conjuring complete works—or sketches of what could become written pieces— in real time. And so Jarrett brings us once more up to that naked flame. The road there is much more familiar than it once was, but this time it’s getting there that makes this feel complete.
Bob Doerschuk (DownBeat)
