Jazz Articles about Ran Blake

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Ran Blake: All That Is Tied

by Norman Weinstein
April 5, 2006

Of the plethora of pianist/composers who have extended the style of Thelonious Monk, none has been as relentlessly exploratory and consistently thoughtful in his experiments as Ran Blake. On this session recorded four decades after his first solo piano album on ESP, Blake revisits material he's recorded in the past, but Blake has never remotely repeated his interpretations routinely. At the age of 70, he will hardly routinize his repetoire now. Blake performs the twelve numbers with ...

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Ran Blake: All That Is Tied

by Jerry D'Souza
March 13, 2006

Ran Blake is still spry at 70. The pianist's thoughts are as fertile as one could ever wish them to be, and he makes fulsome use of them as he enunciates with authority on All That Is Tied, a solo recording made forty years after his first album. Time has not stilled his passion; it still beats strongly within him, along with his sense for discovery. Blake is always alert for a new direction which will spring a surprise. His ...

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Ran Blake: From Music to Film and Back

by AAJ Staff
January 9, 2004

By Matana Roberts More than a four-decade career as a recording artist, a winner of numerous iconic awards (including being named a Mac Arthur fellow in 1988) with more than 30 recordings to his credit collaborating with artists creatively diverse as saxophonist/composer Anthony Braxton, pianist Jaki Byard, and saxophonist Ricky Ford, pianist Ran Blake’s music still sounds fresh, alive and unmistakably matchless. In the following interview Ran really was true to form - full of wisdom and ...

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Ran Blake Trio: Sonic Temples

by Glenn Astarita
November 1, 2001

The legendary Gunther Schuller has the utmost respect for pianist/educator Ran Blake, as he profoundly states: “I have never encountered anyone who can do some of the things that Ran can do with the utmost ease and naturalness." Here, Schuller produces Blake's inaugural piano trio recording, which in retrospect seems somewhat amazing when considering the artist's forty-year recorded legacy.

Along with the chivalrous assistance of bassist, Ed Schuller, drummer George Schuller and guest artist, saxophonist Nicole Kampgen Schuller, Blake invites ...

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Ran Blake: Something to Live For

by Robert Spencer
July 1, 1999

Ran Blake is not precisely a minimalist, although he is seldom loquacious, and has a spare and virtually unerring sense of placement. He is transcendently evocative without ever lapsing into easy sentimentality, and can sum up, with just a few notes, effects that a hundred thrashers and bashers never approach. He can whisper. He can sing and he can pound. He never does anything to excess. He is a master.

Another delightful aspect of Ran Blake's playing - abundantly clear ...