Over het album

For this album I have chosen pieces by my favourite jazz pianists, the ones who have expanded my artistic horizons. I have arranged their classic tunes for my “Random/Control Trio” – we use a total of more than 20 instruments in this group.

We start with Abdullah Ibrahim’s “African Marketplace”, for which we have unpacked our entire arsenal of instruments; it‘s like the ever-changing array of impressions which one can experience at an African market. Hit tunes are often based on simple but ingenious melodies that stay in the listener's ear and immediately establish a mood. Esbjörn Svensson and Carla Bley are complete masters of this art. The concise melody of “Utviklingssang” in fact consists of just one melodic fragment.

For me, Duke Ellington is right up there with the greatest of the European classical composers. It wasn’t easy to find the right piece, though. “In A Sentimental Mood” occupies the middle ground somewhere between his epoch defining suites and his danceable chart-toppers, and feels like a good choice.

The tune “Blue in Green” is officially credited to Miles Davis, but it is Bill Evans with his romantic and graceful piano playing who works his magic into this great jazz classic. “Take Five” was another tune not written by a pianist, but by saxophonist Paul Desmond. It became world-famous through the Dave Brubeck Quartet - and is unthinkable without the bandleader’s piano-playing.

It is basically impossible to pick just one piece each by icons like Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea and Joe Zawinul, because they are responsible for so many works that have inspired the jazz world. As an Austrian, Zawinul has been a shining role model for me, and a “Greatest Hits” album by Hancock was the first jazz CD I ever bought as a teenager.

Of course, this album can only offer a small selection of my influences. Another important one for me was Keith Jarrett’s “My Song” from 1978. I have a very special and emotional relationship with it, because my mother listened to his music throughout her pregnancy, so I suspect that the first composition I ever heard, even before I was born, must have been “My Song”.

In that spirit, we hope you enjoy this piano-journey and all that we have made of it.

David Helbock