Instead he strips these songs to their melodic essence and, gently, lays bare their emotional core.” Jarrett dispenses with the jazz soloist’s conventional emphasis on dexterity, the ‘clever’ phrase, the virtuosic sleight-of-hand. “Tender is the night on what is, perhaps, Keith Jarrett’s most intimate album. Longstanding record label ECM sum up the recording beautifully: Then something started to click with the mike placement, the new action of the instrument,… I could play so soft,… and the internal dynamics of the melodies… of the songs… It was one of those little miracles that you have to be ready for, though part of it was that I just didn’t have the energy to be clever.″ĭedicating the album to his second and then-wife, Rose Anne, Jarrett departs here from the improvised aesthetic of his solo concerts to focus on delivering finely-crafted covers of jazz ballads and folk songs, his playing throughout shot through with sincerity and unmistakable affection: I’d just had my Hamburg Steinway overhauled and wanted to try it out, and I have my studio right next to the house, so if I woke up and had a half-decent day, I would turn on the tape recorder and play for a few minutes. ″I started taping it in December 1997, as a Christmas present for my wife. In an interview for Time magazine in 1999, Jarrett explained: For starters, it is not a concert recording, but was recorded at the pianist’s home studio in rural New Jersey towards the end of a bout of chronic fatigue syndrome that removed him from the live circuit. The Melody At Night, With You broke fresh ground for Jarrett when it was released in 1998. Since its release in 1975, Jarrett has built on this legacy with dozens of solo releases, most being live recordings of wholly improvised concerts, as well as dozens of albums with his Standards Trio. Notching up global sales of more than 3.5 million, the Köln Concert album is not only the best-selling solo recording in jazz history, but also the best selling piano recording ever made. Pianist Keith Jarrett is perhaps still best known for his legendary Köln Concert recording. I’ll get straight to it – this music is a very special recommendation. I am absolutely delighted that, 20 years after its release, Schott Music have brought out a complete sheet music transcription of the ten album tracks, by Friedrich Grossnick.

Keith Jarrett has long been one of my piano heroes, his album The Melody at Night, With You an all-time favourite recording. Featured publications are selected for review by ANDREW EALES

Keith jarrett my song transcription