Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Ted Rosenthal: The 3 B's

158

Ted Rosenthal: The 3 B's

By

View read count
Ted Rosenthal: The 3 B's
Lucky for us that jazz is virtually meaningless in the bigger picture of today’s popular entertainment. I say this because if music were like art at the turn of the century, this recording by Ted Rosenthal may have caused fistfights. It’s not that the solo pianist has created a shocking Nude Descending a Staircase as much as he is making music like those old Reeces Cup commercials. “Hey, you got your jazz in my classical.” “No, you stuck your classical in my jazz.”

Rosenthal a former winner (1988) of the Thelonious Monk piano competition is also a very gifted classical music pianist. He chose three B’s for this record, Bud, Bill and Ludwig, err Bud Powell, Bill Evans and Beethoven. The logic of the music selected appears to focus on Bill Evans. He would be the Jeopardy answer to the question: What do you get when you mix bebop with classical music?

Back to the fist fight. Classical fans opine you cannot improvise on the sonatas of Beethoven. Rosenthal does. Jazz aficionados (those of the Monk, Bird, and Bud ilk) cringe at the clarity in which Rosenthal proceeds with Bud Powell’s “Celia” and “Wail,” because we loved Bud, warts and all.

Rosenthal has a precision about his playing that is more about the academic lifeline jazz holds onto today, then the rent parties worked in the 1950s. The first few go-rounds with the music selected leaves the listener cold on the Powell music (too sterile), scratching their head on the Beethoven (where did he detour from the written parts?), and satisfied with his take on Evans.

Repeated spins and the three composer’s music integrates into not three styles but one voice, that of Rosenthal. Sure nobody can play “Parisian Thoroughfare” like Bud, and Rosenthal has no desire to.

His classically modernist take on Powell and Evans fits hand-in-glove with the improvised Beethoven.

Track Listing

I Loves You Porgy; Tempus Fugit; Improvisation On Beethoven

Personnel

Ted Rosenthal

Album information

Title: The 3 B's | Year Released: 2002 | Record Label: Playscape Recordings

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT



Ted Rosenthal Concerts


Support All About Jazz

Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

More

Tramonto
John Taylor
Ki
Natsuki Tamura / Satoko Fujii
Duality Pt: 02
Dom Franks' Strayhorn
The Sound of Raspberry
Tatsuya Yoshida / Martín Escalante

Popular

Old Home/New Home
The Brian Martin Big Band
My Ideal
Sam Dillon
Ecliptic
Shifa شفاء - Rachel Musson, Pat Thomas, Mark Sanders
Lado B Brazilian Project 2
Catina DeLuna & Otmaro Ruíz

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.