Now, on the notion of this pianist ‘intertwining’ Jazz & Classical, the truth is that Jazz was already intertwined with Classical before he came along; heck, right from its inception Jazz has had a direct connection with the classical world despite what some “scholars” say…..
Jazz is Bach; Jazz is Beethoven riding on a disheveled string, yet still, the “B’s” are all up in there:
“Upper-structures, pedal tones, contiguous II-Vs, shifting, sequencing, to modulate or not to modulate, ambiguous structures (is it a dominant 7 flat 9, a diminished, a mix of both, or a variation on both?), etc…..All of the above are directly connected to the B’s (Bach/Beethoven); however, they used different terminology to describe these approaches. I didn’t mention Mozart, but yes, he’s guilty of “Jazz,” too!
