COMPOSERS: Various
LABELS: ECM
PERFORMER: Keith Jarrett, Gary Peacock, Jack Dejohnette
CATALOGUE NO: 014 005-2
On 26 and 28 July 2000, though barely recovered from the debilitating disease ME, Keith Jarrett gave concerts with his trio at London’s Royal Festival Hall to capacity audiences. Although a few standard songs were performed, most of the performances were freely improvised, with no pre-discussion or set structure. The three men had been active in the free jazz era of the Sixties and, after years of playing together, their rapport is magical.
The album consists entirely of the freely improvised music except for one ballad, ‘When I Fall in Love’, as the encore, and the two concerts have been edited into four freely improvised sections entitled ‘From the Body’, ‘Inside Out’, ‘341 Free Fade’ and ‘Riot’.
A very wide range of music and emotion is covered in these performances, which often swing and rock ecstatically. Any member of the trio can initiate a new direction. In the first section there’s an eloquent and witty bass solo and when Jarrett and DeJohnette join in, Peacock plays a high urgent bass figure which they pick up on and the whole performance sparkles.
Other high spots are the slow, marvellous, hymnic gospel performance in the second section; the brilliant virtuosity in the bravura third section; and, in the short last section, ‘Riot’, the extraordinary rhythmic violence and dissonance of Jarrett’s piano-playing, which is exceptionally original and exciting. Vociferous applause erupts and the audience is now ready for the ballad.