This comprehensive survey of jazz piano, beginning with a brief history of the instrument within the jazz tradition and concluding with interviews that present twenty-seven pianists in their own words, is both wonderfully anecdotal and a serious piece of jazz history. Lyons has assembled a giant concert of piano voices—Bill Evans, Herbie Hancock, Teddy Wilson, Oscar Peterson, Keith Jarrett, Randy Weston, Cecil Taylor, Horace Silver, Dave Brubeck, Sun Ra, McCoy Tyner, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Chick Corea, and many others. The pianists are candid, intense, and always opinionated. Yet their responses are infused with a keen appreciation for fellow musicians, their contemporaries, and those who came before—Walter, Tatum, Ellington. For pianists everywhere, whatever their individual style, this book will speak to and for you as it expresses the thoughts of its many great artists.
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About the Author
Len Lyons is the author of The 101 Best Jazz Albums, a listener's guide to jazz on records. He has produced records, written liner notes, and contributed articles to Downbeat, Musician, Keyboard, and other magazines. A pianist himself, he studied with Lennie Tristano. He lives in Berkeley, California.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Insightful glimpses into great minds,
This review is from: The Great Jazz Pianists: Speaking Of Their Lives And Music (Da Capo Paperback) (Paperback)
For jazz pianists this is a valuable resource. Lyons, a classically-trained pianist, asks somewhat consistent questions to each of the pianists presented but is also a skilled interviewer and knows how to go off on a tangent when appropriate. He also manages, for the most part, to avoid the (to me anyways) boring questions about the artists' current touring schedules, newest records, etc.I wouldn't classify all of the pianists in this book as being representative of the "greats"; Billy Taylor and Marion McPartland, while certainly brilliant and important in their own ways, would probably not make the short list of great pianists for most pianists and jazz fans. Also, since this book's publication, many great pianists have emerged on the jazz landscape that are arguably equally deserving of the title "great". However, most of the list is truly stellar, including Herbie, Chick, Keith, McCoy, Bill, Oscar, Horace Silver, Teddy Wilson, and many other extremely influential pianists. The interviews with Mary Lou Williams and Cecil Taylor are particularly entertaining to read because they are extremely opinionated. In fact, many of the great pianists, you will notice, are very opinionated, and perhaps this is part of what makes them great.
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Inside This Book
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First Sentence:
At the turn of the century-before the age of radio, television, high-fidelity recording, and computerized video games-the piano was one of the focal points of American family life in the home. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
jazz piano tradition, younger pianists, jazz feeling, other pianists, own trio, acoustic piano, most pianists, selected discography, electric keyboards, electric piano, stride piano Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Art Tatum, Bud Powell, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans, Charlie Parker, Cecil Taylor, Teddy Wilson, Blue Note, Keith Jarrett, Herbie Hancock, Benny Goodman, Fats Waller, Los Angeles, Sun Ra, Chick Corea, Earl Hines, George Shearing, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, Billie Holiday, John Lewis, Art Blakey New!
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Front Cover | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
At the turn of the century-before the age of radio, television, high-fidelity recording, and computerized video games-the piano was one of the focal points of American family life in the home. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
jazz piano tradition, younger pianists, jazz feeling, other pianists, own trio, acoustic piano, most pianists, selected discography, electric keyboards, electric piano, stride piano Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Art Tatum, Bud Powell, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans, Charlie Parker, Cecil Taylor, Teddy Wilson, Blue Note, Keith Jarrett, Herbie Hancock, Benny Goodman, Fats Waller, Los Angeles, Sun Ra, Chick Corea, Earl Hines, George Shearing, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, Billie Holiday, John Lewis, Art Blakey New!
Books on Related Topics | Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Citations (learn more)
This book cites 22
books:
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4
books
cite this book:
- Duke Ellington by Scott Yanow on 5 pages
- An American in Paris by Gershwin on page 243
- The New World by George Evans on page 311
- The Encyclopedia Of Jazz (Da Capo Paperback) by Leonard Feather in Back Matter
- on page 287
See all 22 books this book cites
- Jazz in Black and White: Race, Culture, and Identity in the Jazz Community by Charles D. Gerard in Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
- Blutopia: Visions of the Future and Revisions of the Past in the Work of Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton by Graham Lock in Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
- Swinging the Vernacular: Jazz and African American Modernist Literature (Studies in African American History and Culture) by Michael Borshuk in Back Matter
- In the Course of Performance: Studies in the World of Musical Improvisation (Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology) by Bruno Nettl on page 289
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