Paul Bley

Paul Bley - Paul Bley & Scorpio (1973) {Milestone MCD9046 rel 2006}
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© 1973, 2006 Milestone Records / Fantasy / Universe Italy | MCD 9046
Jazz / Modern Creative / Post Bop / Keyboards

The Milestone label released several of this artist's better records in which he flirts, indeed gets seriously involved, with electronic keyboards. This one is the album where he goes head over heels for the electric piano, and fans of jazz with that Fender Rhodes sound are going to want it, even if the photographer decided to make the normally dignified pianist look like Pinnochio in both of the shots. Paul Bley sits at a bank of keyboards here, giving forth a passage on acoustic, then some chirping synthesizer, then some electric piano, and so forth.

Gary Peacock shares front-cover billing with Paul Bley on this 1970 session, but drummer Paul Motian is also present on the first five tracks. (Billy Elgart replaces Motian on the remaining three.) There's a curiously straight-ahead, tempo-driven feel to this short and sweet disc, quite unlike the free aesthetic that Bley, Peacock, and Motian put forward when they returned to ECM as a trio on 1999's Not Two, Not One.

The sound of Paul Bley's trio brings to mind Lennie Tristano immediately as this recording begins, and for once Bley is playing with a heavy enough touch so that an appropriately dark-toned curtain shrouds the music; out of this bursts a series of blues choruses that are incredibly inspired. Thus begins one of Bley's most enjoyable albums, a recording from New York City in the early '60s that has been issued in close to ten different versions. The acquisition of these tapes by the French BYG label right away spells trouble, especially for anyone hoping to collect royalties. Jazz fans will encounter several different cover photographs for these loose Footloose! releases, even involving several different pipes being smoked by Bley.

The sound of Paul Bley's trio brings to mind Lennie Tristano immediately as this recording begins, and for once Bley is playing with a heavy enough touch so that an appropriately dark-toned curtain shrouds the music; out of this bursts a series of blues choruses that are incredibly inspired. Thus begins one of Bley's most enjoyable albums, a recording from New York City in the early '60s that has been issued in close to ten different versions. The acquisition of these tapes by the French BYG label right away spells trouble, especially for anyone hoping to collect royalties. Jazz fans will encounter several different cover photographs for these loose Footloose! releases, even involving several different pipes being smoked by Bley.

Paul Bley & Gary Peacock - Partners (1989) {Sunnyside SSC3503 rel 2001}
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© 1989, 2001 Owl Records / Sunnyside Communications / Universal | SSC 3503
Jazz / Modern Creative / Post Bop / Piano / Bass

Paul Bley had known and collaborated with Gary Peacock since 1962, so by the time this duo session was recorded, one could expect that a certain degree of musical empathy would be in play. And yes, here there is plenty of the give and take of two old friends who do not go along with the mainstream jazz program. Yet one could also call this an album of twin monologues, for ten of the 15 tracks here are solo improvisations for each player, with the five duo numbers interspersed between them.

Paul Bley, Jimmy Giuffre, Steve Swallow - The Life of a Trio, Sunday (1989) {Owl Records OWL060CD rel 1990}
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© 1990 Owl Records | OWL060CD
Jazz / Contemporary Jazz / Avant-Garde Jazz / Chamber Jazz

The second night of the 1989 reunion in New York of the 1961-1962 Jimmy Giuffre 3 with pianist Paul Bley and (now electric) bassist Steve Swallow in some ways eclipses the first. The fact that there is more integration between the trio members as a whole than on the first evening is certainly one place to start. At the very beginning, "Sensing" – with Giuffre on soprano and Bley playing bass notes in the lowest register as Swallow enters and takes over the role and Bley moves to the middle – is a stunner, though it is only four minutes and 13 seconds long.

This 1987 date teams the iconoclastic pianist with guitarist Bill Frisell, drummer Paul Motian, and British saxophonist John Surman. While it's easy to argue that, with Manfred Eicher's icy, crystalline production, this was a stock date for both the artists and the label, that argument would be flat wrong. Bley was looking for a new lyricism in his own playing and in his compositions. He was coming from a different place than the large harmonies offered by augmented and suspended chords and writing for piano trios. The other band members – two other extremely lyrical improvisers in Surman and Frisell.

Paul Bley & Sonny Greenwich - Outside In (1994) {Justin Time Just 69-2}
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© 1995 Justin Time Records | Just 69-2
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Avant-Garde Jazz / Piano / Guitar

RIP Paul Bley. In memory of Paul Bley. Paul Bley, a jazz pianist whose thoughtful but intuitive commitment to advanced improvisation became widely influential, died of natural causes Sunday. He was 83. This duet set by pianist Paul Bley and guitarist Sonny Greenwich, after two melodic solos by Greenwich and Bley's feature on "Arrival," becomes a loose bop session. "Meandering" is a blues and, in the tradition of Lennie Tristano, the origins of the originals "Willow" and "You Are" are not too difficult to figure out. The music does meander a bit but mostly swings in a floating way. Although there are some freer moments, this is as straight as Paul Bley has played on records in years and Sonny Greenwich also sounds fairly conservative, at least if one does not listen too closely. It's a relaxed and very interesting set.