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CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Keith Jarrett/Charlie Haden/Paul Motian: Keith Jarrett/Charlie Haden/Paul Motian: Hamburg '72

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Early on in Keith Jarrett's relationship with ECM (the label had released the solo Facing You in 1971), the pianist was recording for three different labels and dabbling in multiple group formations including this trio. In retrospect it's almost unimaginable that a better triad could have existed in comparison to that of Hamburg '72. Jarrett--adding flute, soprano sax and a bit of percussion to his piano performance--bassist Charlie Haden and drummer Paul Motian were the quintessential combo, pulling on their ...

EXTENDED ANALYSIS

Keith Jarrett/Charlie Haden/Paul Motian: Hamburg '72

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With Sleeper: Tokyo, April 16, 1979 (2012) and Magico: Carta de Amor (2012), ECM Records began digging into its archives, unearthing two live recordings that revealed even more about a collection of artists whose reputations were already plenty secure as some of the label's most important from its early years--in the first case, pianist Keith Jarrett's Scandinavian-centric “Belonging Quartet," with saxophonist Jan Garbarek, bassist Palle Danielsson and drummer Jon Christensen; in the second, the Transatlantic trio of Norway's Garbarek, Brazilian ...

EXTENDED ANALYSIS

Paul Motian: Jack of Clubs

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As a drummer, Paul Motian (1931-2011) came to an early fame from his association with Bill Evans. It was the pianist's 1961 Riverside Records trio albums Waltz for Debby and Sunday at the Village Vanguard that did the trick, shifting the way of the piano trio into the direction of democracy and intricate interplay, also launching Motian's career as a much coveted sideman, with pianists Paul Bley and Keith Jarrett, saxophonist Charles Lloyd and bassist Charlie Haden--a list that just ...

PROFILES

Memories in Motian

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Soon after hearing about Paul Motian's passing (November 22, 2011) I felt the urge to delve (again) into his music. Later on, inspired by a moving writing by Ellery Eskelin (published on his website and reproduced below, by his kind permission), I thought it would have been interesting to collect brief memories from musicians which worked with him during his long career, as well as from those who were deeply influenced by him. So ...

EXTENDED ANALYSIS

Enrico Pieranunzi: Live at the Village Vanguard

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Italian jazz pianist Enrico Pieranunzi, with his melodic romanticism and wondrous sense of harmony, deepened by by his classical training, gets compared often and aptly to the legendary and game-changing pianist Bill Evans (1929-1980). While Pieranunzi's style is more gregarious, and less introspective than that of Evans--and often more abstract--he does share with the late piano icon a penchant for the mode of the interactive trio. In the case of Live at the Village Vanguard, the comparison can be pushed ...

EXTENDED ANALYSIS

Paul Motian: Paul Motian (Old & New Masters Edition)

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In a time when leadership roles are being thrust increasingly upon young musicians who may have the chops, the technique and the theory, but not the experience, drummer Paul Motian could be considered a lesson in patience, in waiting for the right time, in holding off for the precise moment of readiness.It's not that Motian couldn't, perhaps, have begun a career leading groups sooner than November, 1972 when, at the age of 41, he entered Butterfly and Sound ...

CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Motian Sickness: The Music of Paul Motian: For the Love of Sarah

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The parts of the drum set, viewed individually or as a collective whole, fit neatly under the “percussion" heading in the musical instrument world, yet Paul Motian rarely seemed to view them as objects to be struck. Motian found a way to finesse the cymbals, flirt with the drums and free the drum set from the shackles of firm placement and strict time. His painterly approach to playing, which helped to give the Bill Evans Trio its organic identity, set ...

THE MOMENT'S ENERGY

The Veiled Meanings of Paul Motian

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While Paul Motian's music could be regarded as amalgam of the predetermined and the free, that tells only a small part of the story. Similarly, arguing that his drumming was a merging of Kenny Clarke and Sunny Murray is no more helpful, even as it hints at the freedom in his work. But at this moment in time, and of course in light of his recent death in November, 2011, it feels too soon to determine whether or not he ...

CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Motian Sickness: The Music of Paul Motian: For the Love of Sarah

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There is an edge-of-sleep quality to the recently departed Paul Motian's drumming, and to much of the music he recorded. It's a dreaminess that reflects the spark of subconscious creativity even as the body sits at rest. For the Love of Sarah is a tribute to Motian's music, and from the opening moments it's like stepping into the middle of a story about a dream.It would be difficult not to draw comparisons with another recent Motian tribute album ...

JAZZ POETRY

Poetry in Motian

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Shimmering behind Bill's subtle reharmonies of the Gershwin tune LaFaro's pungent doublestops and even that asshole girl's phony laugh at the climax is your intelligence I've never heard nor ever will hear the like it's only Sunday night at the Village Vanguard but I feel it's the garden of Eden Years later it actually was or you made us think it was again when you wrote that primeval drone four notes ...