SouthPark
That is great how he played some piano during the interview, and Rick put on the nice recording at the end. Very good interview vid.
Brad Mehldau Interview
Pete14
Mindbullets, please don’t take offense, but I’m a little bit offended by “the greatest Jazz pianist of our generation” statement, and yes, I totally get what he’s doing (not the first though), but I’d like to show you the best Jazz pianist…..period……end of sentence:
Mindbullets
Pete14 Ha! Herbie is a legend. No offense taken, and that's a great performance. I was more trying to share the interview itself, I didn't think anyone would take Rick's clickbait title too seriously.
Pete14
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!
CyberGene
I don’t watch Rick Beato videos, so I didn’t watch this one either. The guy is annoying, biased and makes click baits. But I used to like Brad Mehldau. I’m not much into jazz nowadays though.
Mindbullets
Ha, I have no personal attachment to that video or Brad (other than enjoying his music and some of his insights in the interview). I wasn't trying to promote Rick's sensational title/description, just (IMHO) a good interview with a musician I figured some folks here might also enjoy.
CyberGene
Mindbullets I might have been harsh towards Beato. I will watch the interview later out of respect for Mehldau. Some of his music is kind of modern classical and not so much jazz.
Mindbullets
CyberGene I don't think you're too harsh. I don't usually watch Beato (especially in the last couple years) for those same reasons, but this one piqued my curiosity. I'm only about 45 mins into it and will probably finish it later. It's a long interview.
Johnstaf
Pete14 heck, right from its inception Jazz has had a direct connection with the classical world despite what some “scholars” say…..
What "scholars"? I can't imagine any scholar denying the fundamental similarities between classical and a lot of jazz. I'm not talking about jazz pianists playing Bach.
Johnstaf
CyberGene I don’t watch Rick Beato videos, so I didn’t watch this one either. The guy is annoying, biased and makes click baits. But I used to like Brad Mehldau. I’m not much into jazz nowadays though.
Any video with a clickbait title automatically gets a downvote from me. It's a shame YouTube doesn't show the number of downvotes anymore.
I also dislike people who trade on the college they attended, as if they have access to some magical arcane knowledge.
Pete14
Johnstaf What "scholars"?
The ones at PW!😆
Pete14
[deleted]
Mindbullets Thank you for sharing this. Mehldau is one of my favorite musicians and the pianist I have listened to the most over the past 30 years since first seeing him in a small pub called Cafe Largo here in Los Angeles in the 90's.
Beato is hands down one of the best interviewers out there at the moment. Very knowledgeable and respectful towards all of his guests which leads to some really wonderful conversations. His interview with Keith Jarret was really moving and it speaks to the respect Beato has from many in the music community that Jarret would open his home to him despite his ongoing health problems.
Just made a fresh pot of coffee and watching this now. This has really made my day, thank you!
vagfilm
Most certainly my fault, but I don’t get Brad Mehldau at all… The trio recordings are fine but the solo recordings do not move me at all. I have ALL Keith Jarrett recordings and many of Chick Corea. Convinced that I may have missed something, bought the box set of Brad solo recordings (6 cds? 7?). Just using space in my hardrive… I cannot finish one track. "Blackbird" drives me mad as artificially smart.
SouthPark
I might have to step in and teach brad something at --
CyberGene
vagfilm I can somehow relate to that but what’s funny is for quite some time he used to be my favorite pianist and I even used “Brad Mehldau” as a nickname on some forums 😀 But then suddenly, after a few years, I lost interest which might have coincided with my switch in preferences from jazz to classical. And I know what you mean by “artificially smart”.
But I recently had a weird experience of mentally recalling a favorite solo piano composition called Resignation from his album Elegiac Cycle (without actually having listened to it for years) and I went to bed with it playing in my head, it sounded in my dreams and I woke up with it… That happens to me from time to time and is luckily always with high quality music. Here it is, I own the score and started learning it after that experience but it’s very difficult:
SouthPark
I'm also trying what Brad is trying - as in trying to open that up. I know what he means though. It can take some thinking to break free. And not always easy to break free - because we're often controlled by what we hear. But always try - and have fun, like legos etc
brad-semi-imp-southpark-north-queensland-australia-p-515.flac
MHirsch
vagfilm artificially smart
Almost agree. Seen him live a couple of years ago, solo. It sounded like he was just practicing on stage.
On the other hand, I love the trio recordings and some of the collaborations with others.
vagfilm
After listening to "resignation" posted by @CyberGene, I thought that I should definitely revisit my Mehldau recordings. So I went back to my boxed set "Brad Mehldau 10 years live solo" and listened to a couple of tracks. The live recordings still drive me mad: his trademark are the pulsating notes on the left hand, and instead of being Jarrett-like hypnotic in which they are so consistent and predictable that they somehow disappear into a sonic fog, Melhdau's left hand is erratic in volume and in time with a lot of small hesitations. Those hesitations keep throwing me off balance and never create that hypnotic background. I don't mind (and appreciate) off-tempo in one of the voices, but not at the rhythm and melody at the same time: that is borderline sloppy (says the guy who cannot keep both hands working together 😀). So, to me, listening to Brad Mehldau (at least the live recordings) is more of a dizzying experience… maybe I should focus on the studio recordings.