Joe's Jazz with Jacky Terrasson

Jacky Terrasson © Universal Music Group

08/10/2019

At 53, an instrumentalist masters, a priori, his art and can enjoy it peacefully. The challenge is not to prove one's excellence, but simply to express it. Jacky Terrasson has today acquired an indisputable jazz serenity and released a new album aptly titled 53 .

For more than 30 years, Jacky Terrasson has been delighting us with his musical enthusiasm. In contact with great figures of the vocal art, Abbey Lincoln, Betty Carter, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Jimmy Scott, Lavelle, in particular, he first chiseled his piano harmonies without prohibiting some graceful daring.

This bold improviser emeritus earned him the recognition of his contemporaries. He will be seen in the company of famous bassist Ray Brown, trumpet player Tom Harrell, saxophonist Eddie Harris, and so many other legendary figures delighted to call on a fellow of this stature.

Honored, very young, by some prestigious prizes awarded by the Thelonious Monk Institute in Washington or the Academy of Jazz in Paris, this melodist end has developed a rich and delicate musicality that raises him to the rank of the best jazzmen of our time. Not content with magnifying the works of his numerous stage and studio partners, he has been publishing since the beginning of the 90s high-quality recordings, rooted in the lyricism and inventiveness of Bud Powell or Ahmad Jamal.

Between swing and academism

Franco-American, born in Germany, Jacky Terrasson navigates between two very musical continents whose cultural codes differ significantly, but whose rich patrimonies have given him a singular reading of the composition. On the one hand, the swing of a century-old jazz, on the other, classical European academism. This double approach to interpretation has opened up a field of gigantic possibilities.

Taking risks is a requirement and a duty for a jazzman. The piano allows, moreover, the most perilous convolutions, as the respectful homage of the tradition. From album to album, Jacky Terrasson has brought out his creative strength by sometimes playing standards. He only let his inspiration guide his fingers on the keyboard.

If he admits having a preference for trio performances, he adapts and appropriates sound contexts. With his accomplice trumpet player, Stéphane Belmondo, he had fun, for example, on the album Mother , to reinvent popular tunes, jazz standards, immortal jingles. The intention is always the same: to reshape with taste and malice the repertoire inherited by the elders.

53 , introspective album

53 flirts with allusions. Here Keith Jarrett, there Mozart, elsewhere Charlie Chaplin ... But the quest for a crystalline tone now outweighs the playful aspect of an evocation or a recreation. This album is clearly an introspective record. And even if some titles, This is mine or Jump , expose the fluttering talent of the soloist, the mood is posed and tenderly blues.

Throughout the 16 tracks that make up this album, a tasty languor accompanies us, just punctuated by a few accelerations that only Jacky Terrasson knows how to inject. 53 is, without doubt, the most palpable imprint of this prodigious pianist. Defining the identity of a musician is a scabrous exercise. Words then confront emotions. It is better to arouse interest than to decipher the essence of an artist. This wonderful music deserves attentive listening, free of prejudices or preconceived ideas. This is the natural, organic expression of a 53-year-old man whose maturity creates the thrill. The admirers of the pianist will be the first surprised.

This disc is even more intimate, personal, true than the previous 18. Do we have that color on his return to Blue Note Records? Maybe ... But do not discount the experience, the know-how and finally the age of the author. Certainly, no musician claims to have reached his goal in the middle of the road.

Being a jazzman is the story of a life. Jacky Terrasson will obviously continue to refine his art throughout his life, but let's stop just a moment and know how to appreciate his mastery in 2019 at 53 years. This step is necessary to note the progressive evolution of an artist. It brings us moments of instant pleasure and dates the promises of tomorrow. It is certain that Jacky Terrasson is already thinking about his future. 53 is a delicious time marker, but our appetite is irrepressible and we are already waiting for 54 .

Jacky Terrasson 53 (Blue Notes Records / Universal Music) 2019

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By: Joe Farmer

Jacky Terrasson

Jazz - France - United States - album

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