Gwilym Is Not An Elb He's Just From Wales

Just one of these days!
I mean- it's great to have a job I really like, which gives me the faintest idea of being able to achieve something real. And I love to practise in the morning to get my share of crazy jazz stuff, and to go to work in the afternoon like a normal person. But I also love the (rare) days when I have no other obligations than to practise.
So that's how I find myself today: really bad weather outside, wearing a cozy jumper, checking out new jazz releases.

The reason for this entry is that I discovered Gwilym Simcock today, a name that instantly went into my "important-musicians-or-just-stuff-I-like-notebook. He is one of these new stars on the jazz firmament so easily checked out thanks to the internet. Just twenty-nine, he already recorded four albums, the newest of them will be released on August 10th. He has two trios, a quartet (with Steve Swallow), a quintet and a bigband, and is very active as a composer, for orchestras and choirs, amongst others. He has first studied classical music and then jazz, and still plays both. Apparently he is already rather well known and has won several important prizes. I'm sure that his is a name to keep in mind!

Audreys Fault

moving fast! the week of the wows.
a week ago, I was preparing for a cozy night at home with Audrey Hepburns movie Sabrina, eating junkfood and grinning, as I admittedly sometimes do when alone, with bliss. One hour into the evening, The Paraglider knocked on my door, told me he just came off the phone with his landlord who told him to move out (long story). Wow one.
Yesterday, I came home from a quick holiday with my girlfriends which was so much fun!!, and once again was really looking forward to the whole cozy night home idea, the same Audrey Hepburn movie and chocolate awaiting... when The Paraglider told me he was home. And how did I find him? In bed, with one elephant-sized foot and crutches, his first paragliding accident. Wow two.

Between being practical and nursy, cooking and going to the drugstore, and being scared to death once again of what could happen to paragliders besides a torn ligament, I managed to play the piano for one hour, the first one after my month of recreation. In these sixty minutes, I thought of nothing else, learned a standard (ironically: "This will be my shining hour"!) and wrote a little piece. Which I might call Audreys Fault. Because let's be honest: I'll never watch Sabrina, who knows what might happen next?!

Coltrane does the trick

Every one know this feeling. It creeps into your soul, digs its sticky fingers into your intestines and slowly makes you feel cold, or lonely, or scared, or just worried. It might be about the end of something, or the start, about the future - or just an undefined unease. It's an unrequested visitor in thoughts, who often won't go after coffee...

Now what we jazz aficionado have in common is the love for an unusual kind of music, that invents and reinvents itself, that moves forward and requires a lot of the listeners, empathy with the players, persistence, and curiosity. We listen to it with open ears and minds and often get something quite undescribable out of it. It's almost like a force outside of everyday life, as if there will always be a backdoor to the daily routine.

Now there are blue moments that require even more than that. Moments when the mind is too lazy to try to figure out things, and they just ought to be beautifully presented on a platter. For moments like that, there is a jazz piece from John Coltrane. Of course - we all know that he was a genius, a thinker and a reformist. But of course he had a heart too, and so I can only recommend to anyone who has ever felt a bit low, to please listen to "I want to talk about you", from Soultrane, 1958 on Prestige, with John Coltrane, Red Garland, Paul Chambers and Arthur Taylor!

Marilyn's frigidaire

I'm through with love, I'll never fall again, said adieu to love, don't ever call again.
For I must have you or no one, and so I'm through with love.
I've locked my heart, I'll keep my feelings there, I have stocked my heart, with icy, frigid air.
And I mean to care for no one, because I'm through with love.

Yesterday I watched a Frasier episode (yes, really!), where Frasier Crane is once again frustrated about not being able to find a woman, and he feels so desperate that he starts to play this old standard (famous since Marilyn Monroe in Some like it hot) on his grand piano. I immediately had to stop watching and start playing myself! I love these songs, their harmony speaks of a long lost time, there's always a harmonic happy ending.
I played it as a cheesy ballad type hotel bar (which is always great fun), and in double-time with a walking bass and stride, and fooled around with reharms. I found out something new: I only listened to the text half-consciously, so I always heard Ella or Nat sing about an icy frigidaire, which left me wondering about the very graphic text-style...

I talked about it to the Paraglider, which brought us to a (long!) discussion about how to interpret the second chord of the tune, Ab diminished (first turnaround: Fmaj7, Abdim, Gm7, C7), because it can't easily be interchanged with a dominant chord. Aren't we geeks? At least we're geeks together (would now be the perfect time to form a Star Trek sign?)

Something I've found which I think is hilariously funny: there's a new jazz festival in Switzerland, in St.Moritz, which is a meeting-point for the rich and the beautiful. Unfortunately, their press material doesn't live up to the standards this particular demographic must be used to. Two pictures got interchanged, which led to this:

I don't know who this is, but it certainly isn't brown-haired, slender and "glassless" Brad Mehldau...

jazz ain't summer music

It isn't, don't you think? In Switzerland, the weather is great since two weeks. In Berne there are (next to bears!) a lot of great bathing spots - you can, by river, see the most important buildings, slowly and lazily floating by for twenty minutes, getting tanned and doing some sightseeing!
For a week now, I've been working, been paragliding (yay!) and eating lots of grilled food. Never ever have I touched a piano. While a break is necessary for wrists and psyche, I still wonder about the compatibility of jazz for hot and sweaty times. When I listen to music now, it's Jimi Hendrix or Janelle Monae or hip new indie bands. I just can't really imagine sitting through Aaron Parks or David Binney or "the old cats" now. Doesn't fit! Can't do that in a little summer dress or a bikini!

The paraglider doesn't agree. As soon as the sun goes down, he's in the mood for playing - which still rules out the hot hours of the day. I wonder what others think about that?

Picture for today: the music academy in Basel apparently is a hot address for classical musicians in Europe. People who actually have soloist careers ahead of them because they're one of a kind come to study here. So there are one of a kind instruments here, too. They are so extraordinary and holy and awesome that they can only be played on very extraordinary and holy occasions. One of which happened last week, it was the diploma ceremony. And since the jazz school belongs to the music academy, the jazz school big band had to play there. And since I'm the piano player in this big band....
Well. It actually meant that I was allowed to play this holy thing! Wow!
(To be honest: I have no idea how it sounds. In a big hall with a high ceiling, there can't be anything louder than a big band, neither I nor anybody else present heard a single sound out of the grand piano. Still! I was allowed to play it!)