Keith Jarrett is one of the great pianists of our times. Before
achieving worldwide fame for his solo improvisations, he had already
collaborated with Art Blakey, Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis. His Köln
Concert album (1975) has now sold around four million copies and become
the most successful solo recording in jazz history. His interpretations
of the music of Bach, Händel, Bartók or Shostakovich, have also received
much attention in later years. Jarrett is considered difficult and
inaccessible, and has often abandoned the stage during his concerts due
to restless audiences or disturbing photographers.
Few writers have come as close to Keith Jarrett as Wolfgang Sandner, who
has not only closely followed Jarrett's remarkable career from the
1960s, but has also had the opportunity to visit him in his home in the
United States. For this biography, which is full of detailed musical
analysis and cross-references to other artistic genres, Sandner has
collected new information about Jarrett's family background, much of
which is thanks to the translator, Keith Jarrett's youngest brother
Chris. The book explores Jarrett's work with other musicians, in
particular the members of his American and European Quartets and his
Standards Trio, it charts the development of his solo concerts, and it
also investigates his work in the classical sphere, as well as the
highly original music he has created in his own home studio. It also
covers his associations with his various record labels and producers,
notably his unparalleled relationship with ECM and its founder Manfred
Eicher. This English edition is a significantly extended and updated
version of the German original.
