Jazz Articles about Jean-Michel Pilc

Jean-Michel Pilc: True Story

by Karl Ackermann
July 7, 2010

Jean-Michel Pilc has yet to achieve a US prominence that compares to his fellow French jazz pianists, the late Michel Petrucciani and Algerian-born Martial Solal. While both of the latter musicians are frequently cited for their lightning-fast delivery, Pilc shares their agility as well as a finely honed ear for lyricism. But ultimately, Pilc is a different kind of player, interpreter and personality. He counters his own expressive side with a particular state of off-kilter playing that doesn't necessarily allow ...

Jean-Michel Pilc: True Story

by Joel Roberts
May 12, 2010

Paris-born pianist Jean-Michel Pilc continues his impressive series of Dreyfus Jazz releases with True Story, his first album since 2006's New Dreams and the debut effort for his exciting new trio featuring respected veteran drummer Billy Hart and talented Russian-born bassist Boris Kozlov. The 49-year-old Pilc, a resident of New York for the past 15 years, is a self-taught musician whose varied experience includes playing with masters like Roy Haynes, Michael Brecker and Dave Liebman, among many others, as well ...

Jean-Michel Pilc: A Portrait & True Story

by Dan Bilawsky
March 28, 2010

If pianist Jean-Michel Pilc hadn't become a musician, he might have had a brilliant career as a philosopher or historian. Throughout John McCormick's film, Jean-Michel Pilc: A Portrait, which highlights Pilc's music and his thoughts on music and art, Pilc doles out grains of truth that are brilliant in their simplicity and speak directly to his manner of performing and composing. Pilc explains that he has never drawn a distinction between different styles or labels, like “classical" or “jazz," and ...

Jean-Michel Pilc Trio at the Douglas Beach House in Half Moon Bay

by Bill Leikam
February 15, 2009

Jean-Michel Pilc TrioDouglas Beach HouseHalf Moon Bay, CaliforniaJanuary 25, 2009

Jean-Michel Pilc's fingers popped over the keyboard with an opening ferocity that awoke the Sunday audience, as though he were defying the listener not to be impressed by his piano style. He tends to put his whole body into playing, drawing from the piano a crystalline clarity that not many pianists can bring forth from the keys. More often than not, Pilc laced the tunes ...

Jean-Michel Pilc: New Dreams

by Budd Kopman
February 6, 2008

From the first notes of the opening tune “But Not For Me" on the wonderful New Dreams, you know that pianist Jean-Michel Pilc is a master improviser. What he does goes way, way beyond the changes and involves getting at the most essential kernel of the tune. Finding it, he can mutate it in countless ways because he knows that we can hear its connection to the tune, all the while holding our mental breaths as he darts away from ...

The Jean-Michel Pilc Trio at The Jazz Standard, NYC

by Budd Kopman
October 21, 2007

The Jean-Michel Pilc Trio at the Jazz StandardThe Jazz StandardNew York City, New YorkOctober 3, 2007 The very air crackled as pianist Jean-Michel Pilc, with his long-time compatriot, drummer Ari Hoenig and bassist Christopher Tordini tore through a set in the way only Pilc can. Having just come out with a new album, New Dreams (Dreyfus, 2007), the pianist devoted part of the set to tunes from that album. However, since ...

Jean-Michel Pilc: New Dreams

by Laurel Gross
October 14, 2007

Like a master builder, pianist Jean-Michel Pilc constructs and reconstructs, but instead of fixed or stable edifices his creations are more like castles in the air. All the better. There's nothing stiff or rigid about what he makes through his playing and composing so there's room for listeners to breathe as they explore these new spaces with him. If all this sounds a bit strange, just listen to New Dreams. Move along with him note to note, ...