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The Standards Trio In Seattle

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The first ballad of the evening was
Keith Jarrett, Gary Peacock, Jack DeJohnette
Benaroya Hall, Seattle, WA
Friday, November 14, 2003
Presented as part of the Earshot Jazz Festival

Walking into Benaroya Hall at 7:55pm it was apparent by the hundreds of people in line at will call that the scheduled 8pm start would have to be postponed. Visions of an ultra-sensitive Keith Jarrett expressing displeasure to his road manager with an icy stare and harsh word flashed immediately to mind. Jarrett’s manager, in turn, was undoubtedly expressing his displeasure in the face of the local concert promoter. Benaroya Hall, home to the Seattle Symphony, is a modern, state-of-the-art, multimillion dollar jewel of a performance facility, but backstage, at 8:15, couldn’t have been very nice. The canned music box chimes in the lobby, designed to usher herds of late arrivals to their seats, possessed an especially maniacal ring.

Given the late start, the question became: Would Keith take it out on the audience with a purposely sullen performance? The answer, happily, was negetive. However, his onstage comment following intermission (“We’re not in a Walt Disney cartoon, although it feels like it.”) seemed to be directed at whatever daffy histrionics had occurred backstage.

RISING FROM THE ASHES

Keith Jarrett, Gary Peacock and Jack DeJohnette – The Standards Trio – began with a pair of medium-swing, 32-bar, jazz standards (“Old Country” and “Everything I Love”) delivered in the traditional way—piano intro, opening chorus, piano solo, bass solo, drum solo, out chorus. This form has been the norm in jazz since small groups started to flourish in the late 1940s, and, on every night of the week, thousands of bands throughout the country perform jazz standards in this way. Of course, very few are able to sell-out concert halls on a consistent basis.

The trio’s third offering was not a standard, and it provided a change of pace in the form of Peacock’s repeated, hypnotic, pedal bass note—a steady rhythmic foundation which stirred the pianist from his bench. Rising as if entranced, Jarrett uncoiled single-note and double-note ideas, striking the keyboard in time with the bass’s primeval rhythm. DeJohnette’s drumming added fuel to the fire, which, in a heartbeat, was suddenly extinguished. Next: silence, filled by uproarious applause, and Peacock’s huge, wondrous grin rising from the ashes of the music just passed.

The first ballad of the evening was “I Thought About You,” and it offered a glimpse of Jarrett at his interpretive best. Seizing upon notes in the melody and extrapolating them into patterns both ingenious in their simplicity and astounding in their complexity, Jarrett painted images in sound of emotions that linger long after the call for final boarding. Frustrating, however, was the unsteady tempo that took a backseat to the soaring melodic line. At times, piano, bass and drums were clearly out of synch in search of the downbeat.

The closing tune of the first set presented a complete contrast to the aforementioned ballad. An unidentified, free composition, without melodic or harmonic constraints began with an up-tempo syncopated intro played in unison, and continued with blazing rhythm as the trio’s only signpost.

THEY’RE AN AMERICAN BAND

Jarrett opened the second set with “Someday My Prince Will Come,” a piece included on the trio’s latest recording, Up For It (ECM, 2003). As the ballad drew to a close, he indicated the mode of royal transport with a finishing quote from “Surrey with the Fringe on Top.”

It is worth noting, however, that prior to beginning the set, Jarrett chose, rather uncharacteristically, to address the audience in order to comment on the piano and to tell a story.

First, the set-up of Benaroya’s Steinway grand. Astute observers may have wondered why its lid was only half-open. This, Jarrett explained, was due to the magnified volume of the hall’s acoustics; with the piano’s lid fully open, the sound generated on-stage was overwhelming.

This explanation gave rise to an amusing and harrowing anecdote from his boyhood. At the age of 14, Jarrett was rehearsing with the Berklee Jazz Orchestra. It seems a single loose screw caused the piano’s massive wooden lid to sway like an old growth fir and come crashing down on the piano bench, barely missing young Keith who, moments earlier, had the good fortune to leap out of harm’s way. Moral: “Our lives are dangerous too, it’s not just the athletes.”

Occupational hazards aside, let it never be said that Keith Jarrett doesn’t have fun playing music. “God Bless the Child” done in an R&B, soul-funk feel was the highlight of the set, if not the evening. Like many Jarrett interpretations, this one kept building in energy and intensity, until the pianist was rockin’ back and forth to the beat ala Stevie Wonder or Ray Charles. This was a tune with roots in the church, presented with a vibe to inspire dancing, clapping, hollering, testifying. Unfortunately, its essence was completely lost on audience members who sat quietly throughout the extended jam session, locked into their seats like stolid symphony-goers. Jarrett and Co. was inviting Seattle to party down, but no one showed up.

Two encores followed, including a breathtaking version of “When I Fall in Love,” and it was 11pm when I found myself out on the street again, marveling at the relevance of the Standards Trio after 20 years.

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