COMPOSERS: KEITH JARRETT & CHARLIE HADEN
LABELS: ECM
PERFORMER: Keith Jarrett (piano), Charlie Haden (bass)
CATALOGUE NO: 273 3485
Pianist Keith Jarrett and bassist Charlie Haden have in common that special ability to transfigure the American Songbook, to elevate it with an ecstatic longing. So to find them together playing a programme of heart melting standards such as ‘Body And Soul’ and ‘For All We Know’ makes so much sense, you wonder why they kept us waiting.
The idea came to them after collaborating briefly on Haden’s Rambling Boy bluegrass project in 2007 and was consummated in a four-day session at Jarrett’s New Jersey home. The set list is perfect, down to the inclusion of Randy Crawford’s ‘One Day I’ll Fly Away’.
This is Jarrett’s first studio disc in over ten years, preferring the live trio format, but he sounds comfortable with Haden: shifting the balance, emphasising the melody, then withdrawing for Haden’s deep grained bass lines to pick up. Jazz that is not so much improvisation as melodic sublimation. Garry Booth