Author Description

This is a comprehensive survey of jazz piano, beginning with a brief history of the instrument within the jazz tradition and concluding with interviews that present twenty-seven pianists in their own words--Bill Evans, Herbie Hancock, Teddy Wilson, Oscar Peterson, Keith Jarrett, Randy Weston, Cecil Taylor, Horace Silver, Dave Brubeck, Sun Ra, McCoy Tyner, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Chick Corea, and many others. "From Fats Waller and Duke Ellington to Herbie Hancock and Keith Jarrett, pianists have always been among the major innovators in jazz. They are by far its most popular instrumentalists. Now,... award-winning jazz critic Len Lyons presents a remarkable overview of the jazz piano tradition--from ragtime and stride to modern, fusion, and free jazz--as seen through the lives and musical perspectives of its most important artists. Lively, penetrating, richly anecdotal, Lyons's interviews with twenty-seven of the major jazz pianists of our time envelop the reader in the world and the spirit of jazz: the color and texture of the music, the rent parties, and nightclubs, and recording studios, and, most of all, the genius, the passion, and the dedication of the men and women at the keyboards. The pianists are candid, intense, and always opinionated. Yet their responses are infused with reverence for their fellow musicians and for those who came before them. The interviews are preceded by a comprehensive survey of pianists and jazz styles from 1900 to the present, and each interview is illustrated with an intimate portrait by photographer Veryl Oakland. There are selected discographies for each of the pianists interviewed, as well as a list of recommended albums for the more than one hundred pianists discussed in the survey. Wonderfully conversational and personal, full of rare gems of jazz lore, [this book] is also a serious and informative reference for jazz enthusiasts."--Dust jacket.