Il sito del Detroit Free Press ha pubblicato una bella intervista con il pianista Bill Charlap, che insieme al suo trio con bassista Peter Washington ed il batterista Kenny Washington forma una delle formazioni più solide e durature della storia del jazz. La formazione è specializzata in delicati e sottili arrangiamenti di celebri standard di jazz, che riprende le influenze di musicisti quali Ahmad Jamal, Tommy Flanagan e Hank Jones.
How does it feel to play with Peter and Kenny after nearly a dozen years?
There was chemistry right away. You can't invent that. It felt like a band right away. Now it's developed to the point where the intuition is even more so. We've played in all kinds of rooms, concert halls, under all kinds of conditions, so we can adjust to anything. We've also developed in terms of repertoire. The book probably has over a hundred pieces in it -- and that's beside what we can just call on the stand.
The sense of arrangement and personality happens naturally now. There are certain musical cues, little things, intuitions, where maybe it's time to double-time or somebody picks up on a rhythmic idea that becomes part of the improvised arrangement. Sometimes you can't quite tell what's arranged and what isn't.
Does the fact that the band relies on the Great American Songbook and jazz classics rather than original material make it more challenging to develop a unique identity?
I think we're just being ourselves. It's not that there's a challenge to find an original voice; that's not something I think about at all. I just try and approach the music in a natural way, and it should come out in a personal way because it is. It's not a mystical thing.
The trio knows the history so well, however, that at any given point you can reference very specifically, say, Tommy Flanagan or a record Hank Jones made in 1957.
We don't want to do that. They already did it, and you can only do it worse if you're trying to imitate somebody else. You can't own somebody else's spirit. I don't think that Hank Jones or Teddy Wilson said, "I need to forge my own sound and here's how I'm going to do it. I'm going to cut away this and this and I'm only going to explore this." No musician thinks like that.
I can't imagine that anyone does anything but follow their own sense of organization. Any real artist develops from inside-out. Especially when you present music with a very clear concept, sometimes people infer that's all you like or all you're influenced by. That couldn't be further from the truth. A big part of what gives artists dimension is how wide their scope is. But that doesn't mean that you want to play like that or that your playing comes out reflecting something you're a fan of.
Si può trovare l'intervista integrale a questo indirizzo.
Ecco un video del trio di Bill Charlap registrato al Village Vanguard, che presenta In the Still of the Night
How does it feel to play with Peter and Kenny after nearly a dozen years?
There was chemistry right away. You can't invent that. It felt like a band right away. Now it's developed to the point where the intuition is even more so. We've played in all kinds of rooms, concert halls, under all kinds of conditions, so we can adjust to anything. We've also developed in terms of repertoire. The book probably has over a hundred pieces in it -- and that's beside what we can just call on the stand.
The sense of arrangement and personality happens naturally now. There are certain musical cues, little things, intuitions, where maybe it's time to double-time or somebody picks up on a rhythmic idea that becomes part of the improvised arrangement. Sometimes you can't quite tell what's arranged and what isn't.
Does the fact that the band relies on the Great American Songbook and jazz classics rather than original material make it more challenging to develop a unique identity?
I think we're just being ourselves. It's not that there's a challenge to find an original voice; that's not something I think about at all. I just try and approach the music in a natural way, and it should come out in a personal way because it is. It's not a mystical thing.
The trio knows the history so well, however, that at any given point you can reference very specifically, say, Tommy Flanagan or a record Hank Jones made in 1957.
We don't want to do that. They already did it, and you can only do it worse if you're trying to imitate somebody else. You can't own somebody else's spirit. I don't think that Hank Jones or Teddy Wilson said, "I need to forge my own sound and here's how I'm going to do it. I'm going to cut away this and this and I'm only going to explore this." No musician thinks like that.
I can't imagine that anyone does anything but follow their own sense of organization. Any real artist develops from inside-out. Especially when you present music with a very clear concept, sometimes people infer that's all you like or all you're influenced by. That couldn't be further from the truth. A big part of what gives artists dimension is how wide their scope is. But that doesn't mean that you want to play like that or that your playing comes out reflecting something you're a fan of.
Si può trovare l'intervista integrale a questo indirizzo.
Ecco un video del trio di Bill Charlap registrato al Village Vanguard, che presenta In the Still of the Night
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