Dear everyone! Welcome to Pianoroll, my blog!
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I’m going to mention to you the names (and sites) of young musicians I’d like you to check out. I discovered most of them on the Internet, but some I met in person. And I’m going to show you videos of my performances. I hope you’ll enjoy my blog and stay in touch.
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Note: I begin by reposting some old stuff that was blown away when we reinstalled WordPress. So the first 10 or so posts are from last year.
Ariel
I went on a trip to the Veneto, in Italy, and stayed in Vicenza and Venice. In Vicenza, my teacher, Jean Claude Jones, and I played at the Vicenza Jazz Festival. It went really well. We played a mixed program that included my tunes, a few standards, and four Gregorian chants that we arranged for jazz. This is one of the better shots taken during the sound check.
For an encore I played solo an Italian tune by Domenico Modugno called “Vecchio Frack.” Here is the original tune sung and played wonderfully by Modugno:
And this is my version:
The thing I say in Italian (Spero che riconosciate) means “I hope you recognize,” which I think they did, although I didn’t use enough hints of the tune in the solo. I did an intro based on a small part of the tune and then I went straight into the solo. After the solo I came back and played the great Modugno tune.
Earlier this year I saw John Zorn and his band Massada in Tel-Aviv. I found it very interesting because the tunes are so varied. Some tunes sound like Ornette Coleman, some like straight jazz with a Jewish flavor, and some of them are almost Jewish music played like jazz. I think this is very original because on one hand it can be very Jewish, but the quartet improvises on it like regular jazz. The players of course are John Zorn, Dave Douglas, Greg Cohen, and Joey Baron.
Dave Douglas is truly my favorite jazz trumpet player today. He is note perfect, interesting, and has such beautiful harmonies. I just loved the concert. The second half of the concert featured a band called Moonchild. John Zorn didn’t play, so the band was led by Mike Patton. He is supposed to be a singer, but in my opinion he is more of a screamer. I liked Massada a lot better.
There is a great Israeli jazz pianist named Avi Adrian. He owns a very funny bird, named ARIK, that sings the blues. This bird REALLY sings the blues. In the linked video, ARIK joins Avi during a lesson he’s giving to a kid. In my opinion ARIK sings very well.
Here is the video:
ARIK is picking up on what Avi and the student were playing. The piano and the bird are in the same key, time signature, and feel. There are lots of other singing birds on YouTube, some of them very good, but all of them are nothing compared with ARIK.
Matan Porat is a young Israeli composer/pianist. He writes really modern music. One of his pieces is based on a tune by Antonio Carlos Jobim (he sent me the notes of this piece and I find it very difficult to play).
I saw him some time ago at the Jerusalem Theater. He was great. He played some Beethoven, Mendelssohn, and Barber, but what I liked best was his own suite called “For the Piano.” It was very avant-garde. Half the time he was plucking the strings, and in the Toccata he inserted a booklet between the strings of the piano and played only within the range of the booklet. When I first heard that piece on the Internet I thought it was a piece for piano and snare drum. I thought it was awesome.
Matan Porat is a young Israeli composer/pianist. He writes really modern music. One of his pieces is based on a tune by Antonio Carlos Jobim (he sent me the notes of this piece and I find it very difficult to play).
Here are his variations on Jobim’s “One Note Samba.”
Boris Berezovsky is a young Russian classical pianist. I think he’s very sharp and makes the pieces he plays look very difficult (or maybe easy?) because he plays them so well and with such virtuosity.
The video linked here shows him playing the first part of the Prokofiev Sonata No. 7.
I picked this sonata because I love it very much. It has a lot of complicated harmonies and rhythmic patterns that are always on one hand very complex and difficult to understand and on the other hand very beautiful. I think Berezovsky brings this out really well and plays it in a perfect Prokofiev style. Here’s the video (it is the 3rd movement):
“http://www.youtube.com/v/BekKo6-WkVY&rel=1″>
P.S. Don’t mix him up with the politician Boris Berezovsky.
Eldar Djangirov is a young pianist originally from Kyrgystan. He lives in the United States. He is incredible. I love him so much because he is so expressive and at the same time such a virtuoso. What I like about him especially is that he knows every style so well. He knows how to make funk funky, Latin sound like Latin, etc.
Here is an amazing video of him playing Take the A Train.
Eldar has 3 CDs out: “Eldar” (2005), “Live at the Blue Note” (2006 ) and “Re-Imagination” (2007).
Taylor Eigsti is a 26-year old jazz pianist. I like him a lot not only because he is such a virtuoso, which he is, but also because of his really fancy chords and because of his very artistic solos. He usually has long solos, and I love his long lines. The tunes I like best are “Get Your Hopes Up,” “Freedom Jazz Dance,” and “Caravan.”
There are not many of his videos on Youtube, but here’s a link to his site: www.tayjazz.com. Check out “Get Your Hopes Up,” which he plays with his trio.
Taylor Eigsti has 5 CDs out.
I saw Stefano Bollani in Tel-Aviv last year. He is an Italian jazz pianist from Milan. Although he is young, he already has a pretty big following. His quintet is called “I visionari.” I definitely recommend checking him out.
Here is one of his funniest pictures, showing him singing into the piano. (Do you know why everybody is singing into the piano these days? It’s the overtones!)
Below is a link to Caravan, which Bollani is playing here with Martial Solal. If you think it is a different tune, wait a minute… Caravan is just around the corner. I intended to post his version of the famous tune, “Azzuro,” which is available on YouTube, but the quality is not that great. Still you can check him him out on YouTubne. I like “Azzuro” best. It is so smooth…
Here is the link to
Below is a link to Caravan, which Bollani is playing here with Martial Solal. If you think it is a different tune, wait a minute… Caravan is just around the corner. I intended to post his version of the famous tune, “Azzuro,” which is available on YouTube, but the quality is not that great. Still you can check him him out on YouTubne. I like “Azzuro” best. It is so smooth…
Slava Ganelin is a veteran Russian pianist. Although he’s been around for a long time, his stuff is really far out.
He uses little percussion instruments and a keyboard. I like him a lot. His stuff is interesting and sophisticated, and he does a lot of virtuoso tricks that I think are very clever. Check out this video if you’re ready for some super hardcore music (it is a short section of a long piece I filmed at a jazz festival in Jerusalem).
