Michael Fitzgerald

A special music school might not have dedicated their resources to teach younger kids, but you could investigate "kindermusik" programs - not necessarily to enroll but because they would have knowledge of teachers who do work with students that age. Or ask other parents, etc. Since you play, you could just give a friendly introduction (three-note songs, where the fingers go, echoing, etc.) - but I wouldn't let that go too long because you are too familiar to her. Sometimes you can find a summer program that introduces kids to piano. I've seen a lot of success with that. You would be best off with a teacher who has worked with that age before. You can't treat a 4-year-old the same as you would a 10-year-old beginner. Is your child in pre-school? Are they doing any music activity there? http://www.kindermusik.com/ http://www.pianoiseasy.com/showpage.cfm?page=school http://pianoeducation.org/pnotchld.html#Begin There are good ideas in the last - what your child needs to know (numbers 1-5, alphabet A-G, being able to sit and focus for 15 minutes, etc.). I don't know where in NY you are, but in the city there are a bazillion possibilities: http://www.newyorkmetro.com/urban/guides/f...gs/lessons2.htm Hopefully you can find at least *something* nearby. Mike And just a P.S. on the "music as part of everyday life" - YES! Kids should play music on their own, with their friends, with their parents, with their parents' friends. All the time. Reserving performance for the "annual recital" is counterproductive. At my school we just finished doing weekly TV broadcasts (closed circuit) of student performances to celebrate "Music In Our Schools" month. The more opportunities to perform, the better. April is "Jazz Appreciation" month so I've got that to plan next. And ditto for the opportunities to hear and see others perform. Kids need to get out to those free concerts in the park. And they need to meet musicians. Then they will have this positive association that music is enjoyable. As opposed to the hour of Hanon in solitude every day. http://www.smithsonianjazz.org/jam/jam_start.asp

Where do you make the connection that absolute pitch is equivalent to equal temperament? These are not the same thing. And while the young children probably won't be able to demonstrate all the facets of absolute pitch at the start (I didn't - not till I was in junior high school, despite my best efforts), it is the early years that are vital to the development of the part of the brain that controls absolute pitch. Once the "window" closes it is difficult - perhaps impossible. Of course, if the only instrument you hear and play is a 17-note-per-octave harmonium and I tell you again and again that the first four notes are Z, Q, 5, and ~, you most likely won't function the same as someone from the 12-tone A,B,C world. If your home piano is tuned in Werckmeister III, I'd say you'd learn that. If it's tuned 2 tones flat, maybe you'll learn that (if you aren't exposed to anything else). But the scientists are saying that early musical training is needed or else you will lose the ability that you were born with. Learning a tonal language (Chinese, Vietnamese, etc.) is another thing that develops the absolute pitch skill. Here are a few articles addressing the research to which I referred. http://www.news.wisc.edu/releases/5819.html http://www.boston.com/globe/search/stories...ense/041497.htm http://gabrchen.tripod.com/Physics_36.htm http://www.fortunecity.com/emachines/e11/86/rightnote.html http://www.menc.org/networks/genmus/litarticles.html http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s593744.htm I'm sure there are more out there. (BTW, there is also mention in the menc.org article about the increased development of the part of the brain that controls touch perception among those who started keyboard training before age 7.) BTW, "jazz historian" is not my day gig. I am a music educator teaching beginning instrumental music in the public schools. And even the kids I teach don't get to me (age 9) until the very end or after the closing of the window. So getting them playing the piano before that is very important. Mike

Children of 4 1/2 almost certainly don't know enough to make an educated decision. There are also very few choices that a child that age could or should play - wind instruments are pretty much out except for perhaps recorder. The fingers and hands are too small to cover the holes. The teeth are not right either. Best to wait until adult teeth are in before starting a wind instrument. I'd say piano is the best instrument for starting. I started when I was 3 and still haven't learned everything yet. No matter what a child might want to investigate later, the foundation established by the piano in terms of pitch relationships and hopefully the additional training in reading notation will be a great asset. Piano is good for starting because the notes pop right out when you press the right button and they sound good and are in tune. No embouchure, no air flow, no covering holes, no guessing where on the fingerboard that note is. The progress rate can be very rapid - from single note melodies to both hands, to chords. Also, the fixed pitch of the piano helps to solidify the absolute pitch that all children are born with and starting very early is crucial in this regard, according to the scientific studies. Violin is possible (they make tiny tiny scale instruments) but there are the drawbacks of intonation - which is greatly improved if the child has piano background. The other logical option is a percussion instrument, but I would still recommend the piano. All my percussion students who have piano experience progress much faster than those who don't. There are plenty of piano teachers who will work with students that young. Mike

OK....what are you hearing? Can you identify whether there is trumpet, tenor, piano, bass? How many tracks are there? How long is each track? Blakey and Sabu only made a few recordings together. One is the two 1953 duets on Blue Note, then the half of Drum Suite mentioned first, then the Orgy In Rhythm percussion ensemble records, then the Cu-Bop record, then the Holiday For Skins percussion ensemble records. You can tell Orgy In Rhythm apart from Holiday for Skins as HFS has trumpet and OIR has flute. The 3 tracks from Drum Suite have neither. All of these were recorded between 1953 and 1958. Mike

There is an album called Cu-Bop with Bill Hardman, Johnny Griffin, Sam Dockery, Spanky DeBrest, Blakey, and Sabu. Tracks are Sakeena, Dawn on the Harvest, Woody'n You, Shorty. Rec. May 13, 1957 for the Jubilee label, reissued on Roulette, currently owned by Blue Note. If this isn't what you are looking for, it would help a great deal if you could list the tracks or something as a hint. Mike

The basic idea that 6/8 is a compound time seems to be getting lost. No one is advocating tapping your foot SIX times in each measure for Row, Row, Row Your Boat. The whole point is that you tap your foot TWICE. Each tap has three subdivisions. That's what makes it compound as opposed to simple. While triplets happen in groups of three (anything else wouldn't be triplets), there is absolutely no reason why sixteenth notes can't happen in groups of three. This happens in *compound* meters - 3/16, 6/16, 9/16, 12/16, for example. To decide whether something is 4/4 with triplets or 12/8, one should probably check whether there are any instances of even eighth notes - simple subdivision - if this is fairly common and the triplets - compound subdivision - are the exception, then 4/4 is probably the better choice. However, if just about everything is a triplet, then 12/8 is a better choice. The above is null and void in notating jazz, since the swing is not indicated accurately in the rhythmic notation. We write what appear to be even eighth notes but we play long-short uneven swing eighths that are often identical to quarter-eighth patterns in 12/8. Mike

Verve is putting out 'S Make It? Ugh - and this will probably be in one of those "LP replica" packages. There is additional material, such as the long take on "Faith" that was on the "We Had A Ball" various artists issue - it has a John Gilmore solo that was edited out of the 'S Make It issue. I don't know if there are similar situations for other tunes on that record. Is there any time that one of those replica issues have included bonus material? Compared to the Verve Elite series, I give a big thumbs down to the new "It is as it was" Verve line. But still, rather 'S Make It than Hold On, I'm Coming (which I do have as a Limelight CD and sometimes wish I didn't). Mike

Chuck - What happened to "fewer books, more music"? That's the sentiment I was trying to express. (Not that I haven't made, don't make, and won't make arrogant mistakes.....) I do agree that there is something to be learned from everything. However, I find that doing the listening (or the primary research, or the reading from more specialized sources) is more beneficial - to me. I certainly wouldn't want to push my way of doing things on anyone else. I have read neither the Shipton nor the Gioia histories, though I have read other books by them - Groovin' High and The Imperfect Art & West Coast Jazz. I wasn't so impressed with the Dizzy bio (though I did learn from it), but perhaps Shipton is better as a surveyor of the broad history. Eventually I will add both books to my collection, I'm sure. Garth - No Clifford book for me - the plan is Henry Grimes next. After that, probably Lenox SOJ. Mike

It's my understanding that Sheldon Meyer is back in one way or another and is still somewhat active in publishing. If I recall correctly, he's involved in the career retrospective book that Dan Morgenstern is compiling from his old files. But unfortunately Meyer's name on a project isn't a 100% guarantee of quality. The P.O.S. biography of Clifford Brown was something he was (at least nominally) involved in and they don't come much worse than that. I would be surprised to learn that anyone with half a brain had edited or even diligently read that book before it went to press. I have two favorites in the overall histories of jazz - first, I have a sentimental soft spot for The Jazz Book by Joachim Berendt, which just seems to include all the right people even if it only gives some of them a brief sentence, and second, Jazz: From Its Origins to The Present, a textbook by Lewis Porter (with Michael Ullman and Ed Hazell). It dispells myths, is written by a musician for musicians (though nonmusicians certainly can gain much from it), and is quite comprehensive despite the fact that it came out in 1992. Unfortunately it's very pricey as is often the case with college textbooks. As opposed to most people writing those histories, Porter is the self-described "street musician with a PhD". He's a friend and colleague for whom I have a lot of respect. He knows his stuff and tends not to parrot back received wisdom (though there are exceptions to this as I mentioned in the thread on the New Grove). But mostly I have no use for those kind of books. I have a large library and find much more value in getting the monographs. I don't find the need to have Gioia or Shipton or whoever tell me about jazz - I'll get the records and learn for myself. Which is another principle espoused by Lewis Porter. Great interview here: http://www.furious.com/perfect/coltrane2.html and other parts here: http://www.furious.com/perfect/coltrane.html http://www.furious.com/perfect/coltrane3.html Mike

Don't know Renee Rosnes? Have I got a website for you! www.JazzDiscography.com (!) Mike

Don't know Don Friedman??? Have I got a website for you - www.JazzDiscography.com Mike

I'd say "All Blues" is a bad example - I wouldn't say it was 6/8 although it has been described that way. Maybe even notated that way. It's really 6/4, played like 2 bars of 3/4 joined at the hip. "All Blues" and "Someday My Prince Will Come" have way too much in common. The pulse is defined as the bass walks quarter notes in each. 6/8 is a compound meter - easiest example is "Row, Row, Row Your Boat." 3/4 is a simple meter - something like "America"/"God Save the Queen" or "The Star Spangled Banner" for that matter. Mike

Dick Heckstall-Smith (soprano & tenor) Wilbur Sweatman (3 clarinets) Vladimir Chekasin (2 altos) One of Kirk's stritches had a bell taken from a french horn. See Roy Haynes: Out of the Afternoon. Mike

If you haven't heard Phil explain how to spell his last name, you just haven't listened long enough. S as in scent C as in cent H as in hors d'oeuvre A as in Aaron A as in Aaron P as in pneumonia Mike

Maybe 24 hours of Bix music doesn't exist, but Phil Schaap will recite (from memory) the 1903 Davenport city directory (twice - first by family name, then by street name) to fill the remaining time. If that doesn't do it, listeners may call in to try to stump him by giving the record issue number and he'll supply the title. Seriously, on all birthday broadcasts there are additional features that are included: interviews (live or pre-recorded), special sets - so material isn't just played once and never again. "Singin' the Blues" always gets multiple visits. And then there are the biographical narrations that Schaap does - they're interesting the first couple of times you hear them. But even then they need to be checked for accuracy. Mike

And remember, every year after 24 hours of Ornette, 24 hours of Bix immediately follows. And just for this year, 3 billion hours of Coltrane after that. Mike

FWIW, I consider Talk to be the best of anything Yes that involved Rabin. I didn't have any problem about keyboards/lack thereof on the music from Magnification that I heard - it just sounded trite and bland, lacking melodic and harmonic interest and direction/propulsion. I think the tracks that I have heard them do live are Magnification, Don't Go, and In the Presence Of, maybe one more. Some of these are on the YesSpeak DVD and I think there are some things on the Symphonic DVD, too. But then again, "The best Yes album since Drama" isn't such a great award in my book. That's like the old compliment "You sure don't sweat much, for a fat girl." Mike

Yes, but after picking up the box did you have to see a chiropractor?

Surprised that I didn't find previous discussion of this one. As a longtime devotee of McLaughlin, I picked this one up without knowing anything about it. It turns out that it contains as its title selection the reworked version of his second guitar concerto, which I knew as "Europa". Absolutely beautiful. I loved his first one "The Mediterranean" and was disappointed when years and years passed without any recording of the second. I had only heard mention of it. As it happens, McLaughlin went through a few revisions and the one on the new album isn't really a guitar concerto, it features additional soloists, and to very good effect. This is a three-movement piece lasting a total of about 27 minutes. The remainder of the CD is devoted to four jazz tunes: My Foolish Heart (which McLaughlin had recorded before on the "Electric Guitarist" album); The Dolphin by Luiz Eca; Stella by Starlight; and My Romance. These are performed by the same guitar ensemble he used on the "Time Remembered" Bill Evans tribute album (which I have been listened to frequently in recent weeks, coincidentally). McLaughlin writes that each of the pieces is dedicated to a different pianist - Chick Corea, Gonzalo Rubalcaba, Herbie Hancock, and Bill Evans. The Dolphin has a touch of bossa nova, a new style that wasn't ever used on the earlier CD. I'd say there are more "jazz" elements too. Some really swinging passages. Strongly recommended for those who appreciate orchestral music and McLaughlin's beautiful acoustic work. Very understated and rewarding. Mike

I have never bought Magnification because I have been so turned-off by the performances of a few of the tunes from that record that I have heard in concert, and by the other various times I have encountered the music (on DVDs, radio, etc.). I don't hear *anything* there that makes me think of the good old days. It just makes me think that they have lost it and how glad I am that they realize that it's the classic repertoire that folks want to hear, not meaning a bunch of "hits" - they continue to bring out the 20-minute pieces and even dredge up old pieces that were (almost) never performed at the time, like South Side of the Sky. Today I picked up the three latest remasters as well as the DVD "YesSpeak". I've listened to most of Drama, easily my favorite of the three. I am very disappointed that someone dropped the ball on the mixing of "Does It Really Happen?" - after the false ending, the return is supposed to fade in gradually. This is correct on the Joe Gastwirt remaster (Atlantic 82685-2) - the new one (Elektra/Rhino R2 73795) completely misses this important crescendo. To pick a nit, the color matching on the cover (compared to the LP) is better on the Atlantic CD too. The bonus material is wonderful - but why was "We Can Fly From Here" not included? That's one that has circulated for years and would even be played as a rarity on radio specials. Tantalizingly, there's also another version that includes Bill Bruford (!!!) Next - has no one else noticed that the Tormato CD actually has 18 tracks, not 17 as listed everywhere? The final track is a vocal-less backing track version of Onward, one of the few good tunes on the record. Drag that my copy skips incessantly halfway through (maybe that's why they didn't list it). Track 17 is a working version of "Does It Really Happen" called "Everybody's Song" which is phenomenal, showing the direction things might have taken. There are some horrible bonus tracks too (Money - egads!). For all the grief that some people give Drama (which I suspect is knee-jerk mostly because of the absence of Anderson), Tormato is by far the worse record. It's like all the worst bits of Going For The One (which does have some absolutely *marvelous* bits - Awaken, Turn of the Century, Wondrous Stories) - taken and then cut down into little bits. Something like Madrigal could have been expanded into a significant work a la Awaken, but it wasn't. There are other passages on the album that would have also worked well as portions of more fully-developed pieces. Now, 90125 - what is the point of having a release of this which has the catalog number R2 73796???? I bought this just to be complete. There are actually quite a few things that could be reworked into quality Yes music. Of course, those weren't the choices that were made, and that's probably thought of as all the better - witness their commercial success. But personally, I was never a fan of it - I did see the tour which was rather mediocre. But not nearly as mediocre as the next time I saw the band - ABWH. Now THAT album was pure crap. I heard the single on the radio and said, "Well, if that's the single, maybe the album has the adventurous stuff." Boy, was I wrong. The single was actually more adventurous. Periodically I give it another chance but it has always failed miserably. Saw the tour because I never saw Bruford live with Yes and he actually ended up being the weakest link. Playing electric drums does NOT work on things like Close to the Edge. It ruined the show. I was bitterly disappointed by that. Wakeman was as soulless as ever - Bruford certainly has him pegged in that interview above. Very very clean fast playing, but absolutely just scales and arpeggios. No melody, none of the chromaticism that gives solos color. Regarding Bruford's comment about the lack of jazz in progressive rock, I strongly disagree. In Yes, fine, but the work of Keith Emerson, especially in The Nice is filled with jazz harmony, melody, and rhythm, and instrumentation, particularly when they became a trio. Brian Davison was very capable of playing hard swinging drums and the band was doing covers inspired by Keith Jarrett (the version of My Back Pages, the BBC version of Sombrero Sam from the Charles Lloyd repertoire, etc.), Monk, Tristano, and Brubeck. Another seriously jazz influenced progressive group would be The Soft Machine. And King Crimson, particularly in the 1969 incarnation with Ian MacDonald (dig the live stuff issued on the 4-CD set Epitaph). Mike Giles was every bit the jazz player that Bruford was and if anyone has heard the Brondesbury Tapes issue of demos by Giles, Giles, and Fripp (and even the studio album on Deram), it's very clear that jazz was a part of the mix. Back to Yes - the band has done good live shows recently. I preferred the orchestra show to the return of Wakeman, although not because of Tom Brislin, who did not impress. As the Brits say - WANKER! Mike

I frequently borrow a Sony Mavica that uses a mini-CD for storage. I have a couple of rewritable CDRs for that and I can take hundreds of photos at the highest resolution (3 MP, I think - each photo is about 1.3 MB) without any worry about running out of space - and another CDR is way cheaper than any of the alternative memory choices. It can connect to the computer via USB, too. So just download the photos, reformat the CDR and you're ready to go. Are there models still using a mini-CD for storage? I don't see them around. Were there downsides that have led to its being abandoned? Personally, I don't have any problems with it - if I could just get some more zoom, I'd be in heaven. Mike

Misspelled or variant names are a real bitch - what one needs is what is known in the library science world as "authority control" - where there is ONE correct and true entry to which all variants are made to conform regardless of how the boneheads at the various labels print things. Otherwise it's like the tower of Babel - for example with tune titles, you've got: 'Round Midnight 'Round About Midnight Round Midnight Round About Midnight or I Don't Stand a Ghost of a Chance (I Don't Stand) A Ghost of a Chance Ghost of a Chance or how about: Corcovado Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars or: The Blues Walk (Clifford Brown) Loose Walk (Sonny Stitt) Somebody Done Stole My Blues (Chris Woods) So personally, what I try to do is establish what is the correct (or best choice) one and use it everywhere, but note if there is a variant on the issue. For example, I just did an update to the Ted Dunbar discography and found a Frank Wess tune that was labeled "Flowers" on the back sleeve; labeled "Fading Flowers" on the record label; but the same tune exists as "Fading Fleur" elsewhere (earlier reference). So I used "Fading Fleur" and put the other information in a footnote. These issues of conformity appear in other areas too - instruments, labels, etc. Sometimes you just have to make a decision. I'm sure I've made mistakes. Mike

You must have been a math major.... The "11 days" came from down beat 11/17/66, the other date from the Ayler website at http://www.ayler.supanet.com/html/ayler_remembered.html. db was likely inaccurate since it also listed the intended personnel of Henry Grimes and Sunny Murray who didn't make the trip. Mike

I was in the middle of preparing an extensive comment on the subject when Larry posted his well-thought-out review. So I'll present a compact list of more basic errors. The New Grove (I'm speaking of the 1-volume ed. - I have only worked briefly with the new 3-volume one so I can't really say) is part of my library. I don't feel that I wasted the $35 I spent on it. However, there are plenty of mistakes and even more statements that show a lack of comprehensive study of the subject. Onaje Allan Gumbs's middle name is consistently misspelled as "Allen" in his entry. As they say, "Write what you want but at least spell my name correctly!" Once again (started with Feather), Perry Robinson's birthdate is wrong - September, not August. I have problems with the description of Abbey Lincoln's recent work (p. 710): She continues to perform and tour in the mid-1980s and, and has returned to the warm, gentle style that characterized her early work." I hear huge differences between her 1950s work and the recordings made after her return in the 1980s. I hope the new edition addressed this. Just about everything in the Gigi Gryce entry is wrong: birthdate and deathdate, and where he grew up, and about his musical studies, and about when he worked with certain people. So much misinformation here - someone should write a book to correct it. Or at least a webpage: http://www.jazzdiscography.com/Artists/Gryce/ggbio.htm Throughout the book the photo IDs are particularly bad - p.156 "Clifford Brown, early 1950s" - well, yes, but this is a photo of Brown with Gigi Gryce, from the European tour of the Lionel Hampton Orchestra in the fall of 1953. May 15, 1953 is a date that has long been etched into my memory - why couldn't it have been used for the caption of Max Roach at Massey Hall (p. 1049) instead of "1953". Photo on p. 813 purports to be from 1957, but in fact is from an MGM recording session in Los Angeles in the summer of 1959 and doesn't have Buddy Childers on valve trombone but rather Bob Enevoldsen. John Coltrane played Newport on July 2, 1966 - this is a solid, confirmed date. It should have been used for the two photos (p. 13 & 235) instead of simply "July 1966." Ditto for Charles Lloyd at Newport 1966 (p. 578 - also July 2). Albert Ayler was in Europe for 11 days beginning November 3, 1966 so the shot from London (p. 47) at least could have said "November 1966" (probably November 15, 1966 at the London School of Economics from 5 minutes of research just now). Paging through just now, another Newport gaffe - Albert Mangelsdorff with Larry Ridley (p. 746) is, I'm pretty sure, from the jam session on July 4, 1969 (labeled "late 1960s"). Seems like photo captions were left to the student interns - if the back of the photo gave the information it was used, otherwise it was lazy guesswork or worse. I suppose some will say this is being too picky. It's really a matter of consistency since plenty of photos DO identify the exact date and believe me, this information is extremely useful to researchers. But only if it's correct - Art Blakey did not have the lineup shown in the photo on p. 63 on January 29, 1956. Had to be either late 1956 or early 1957. As Blakey is a subject near and dear to my heart, I note that Lewis Porter repeats the oft-told but unverified account of Blakey's visit to Africa (p. 115-116) - "probably for more than a year" - impossible, based on the chronology. Similarly, Keith Jarrett could not have joined Blakey in December 1965 (p. 578) and stayed for four months. In the Nightclubs (NYC) section, I note a correction under Slugs - (which should really be Slugs' according to their newspaper ads) - it did not opened early in 1966, but was open by August 1965. Under "Organ" - it would be nice for people to understand that "electronic" and "electric" are different things. The Hammond organ is NOT electronic (well, at least not the typical Hammond organs like the B-3). Why is so important to get these "little" things correct? Because this information gets regurgitated in books like "Sonny Rollins: Open Sky" by Eric Nisenson - every single fact in two consecutive paragraphs (p. 137-38) comes from the New Grove entry for Henry Grimes. BTW, let's put that (and other Nisenson works) on the NOT for recommended reading list. There is an expectation by the general public that reference works will be correct and comprehensive. New Grove has too many flaws and omissions to pass that test. As far as recommending an alternative for reading - I would suggest The Oxford Companion to Jazz, edited by Bill Kirchner. It certainly isn't an encyclopedia, but rather a collection of 60 essays on important people and topics in jazz. The experts in the field address their specialties, so you get Dan Morgenstern (not Collier!) on Louis Armstrong, Mark Tucker on Duke Ellington, Lewis Porter on John Coltrane, Brian Priestley on Mingus, Randy Sandke on the trumpet in jazz, Jeff Sultanof on jazz repertory, Joel Siegel on jazz singing, Scott DeVeaux on the advent of bebop, etc. etc. Not to forget Chris Albertson on Bessie Smith and Larry Kart on the avant-garde 1949-1967. Mike

Chick Corea has long been a favorite of mine in just about all of his various explorations. The absolute low point was the Elektric/Akoustic Band - but even there one can find a *little* bit of worthwhile music. I have not fully explored the Origin records - only have a couple, but I was greatly impressed, particularly after the Remembering Bud Powell band, which I found disappointing. I thought maybe he had lost it, but Origin proved me wrong. I think the late 1970s-early 1980s period was particularly productive. The records with Herbie Hancock, the further adventures with Gary Burton, Three Quartets, the magnificent reunions of Trio Music, the Again and Again record on Elektra/Musician, the duo with Steve Kujala, etc. Then came the Elektric Band, which started out OK when it was a trio - would be nice if Stretch would issue some of the live material they have in the vault - but quickly degenerated into something FAR worse than even the most gratuitous Return To Forever w/Al DiMeola showboating. Only with Origin did he really pull himself out of this. I don't have a problem with electric music, and I think that Corea made a lot of wonderful things in that vein (not all of it, no) - constantly experimenting because there wasn't an established way to play that stuff. I could see that if you have a problem with electric music or with anything less that "100% pure jazz" that you probably won't want to know about much of Corea's later work. I do also love his acoustic playing and his writing. His distinctive percussive style combined with the colorful harmonic aproach makes it, for me. Of course, I don't mean to neglect the earlier periods cited by some here, but I strongly disagree with the idea that if Corea had died in 1973 (or heaven forbid, in 1970 after leaving Miles) that we would have anything near a complete picture of his artistry. Like Miles Davis, Corea worked in a lot of areas and in my view, was one of the best in each area, definitely not just a dabbler - solo piano, trio, free improvisation, hard bop, adventurous jazz composition, fusion (not fuzak), duos, third stream, Brazilian-influenced, etc. I could easily find masterpieces in any one of those areas. I do consider Corea to be one of the greatest pianists alive, almost on a par with Keith Jarrett. Obviously the two sometimes have very different musical philosophies, but they also have a lot in common. Wish I could have been in Japan to hear them play Mozart concerto for two pianos together. I did get to hear Corea play Mozart and then the US premier of his own concerto. It was a wonderful evening. But Corea is much more than just a pianist, in my view. Jarrett has written some nice pieces, but nothing like the body of repertoire that Corea has. The other member of the triumvirate is Herbie Hancock, who has a far greater ratio of crap to music than Corea. Don't get me started on the night I saw Hancock and Corea together - not during the duo tour, but with both their electric bands. Worst show I've ever seen. Mike