February 24, 2025 • 13 mins
Consider making a donation to The Piano Maven podcast by subscribing to our Substack page (https://jeddistlermusic.substack.com/about), which you also can access by clicking on the "Donate" button here: https://rss.com/podcasts/pianomaven
Links to Bill Evans recordings discussed in this episode:
Love Theme from “Spartacus” - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fdV_C3YGIs&list=OLAK5uy_mE4wobISXrQe5gLICSur-ZoVQNFJGvikM&index=3
Never Let Me Go - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17ucdswp6GA
Reflections in D - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBvd331AbbY
Jed’s article about transcribing Bill Evans’ music - https://www.steinway.com/news/features/bill-evans-transcribing-evans
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
This is Jed Dissler, and welcome to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano
(00:14):
recordings.
You can subscribe to the Piano Maven podcast through my sub stack page by clicking on the
link in the episode description.
Paid subscribers get bonuses such as Piano Maven Zoom meetings, where we share listening
experiences and meet special guests.
So please consider subscribing to help us reach out further into the piano community
(00:37):
and to keep this podcast in production throughout the year.
I haven't done a jazz episode in a while, and I've promised some of our subscribers
that I would be talking more about jazz piano on these episodes.
The influence of Bill Evans on modern jazz piano cannot be underestimated.
(00:58):
Certainly the main influences that he brought to his style came from Bud Powell, Horace
Silver, Lenny Tristano, and George Shearing, and also Milt Buckner in certain ways, especially
with the locked hands chord technique, playing parallel chords in both hands with the melody
on top.
(01:18):
However, Bill Evans' own way of voicing chords and his own way of building improvised lines
was totally original and his style helped pave the way for pianists like Herbie Hancock,
Chick Corea, and Keith Jarrett, and countless others.
Perhaps the most startling innovation that Bill Evans brought to the table, and it really
(01:43):
was a group innovation essentially, it was his approach to the classic jazz piano, bass,
and drums trio setting.
Or the Bill Evans Trio, bass and drums essentially were timekeepers providing a steady support
for whatever the piano was doing.
But with the trio that Bill Evans had with bassist Scott LeFaro and drummer Paul Modian,
(02:10):
each instrument became an equal partner.
You had continuous conversation where a bass line did not have to keep a steady walking
pattern but could break away instead from that and respond to piano lines with lines
of its own.
And the same went for the drums so that the beat was more implied than stated.
(02:35):
And this created a very mobile and flexible and fluid ensemble texture like improvised
chamber music.
And this kind of rhythm section concept began to manifest itself in the various Miles Davis
ensembles of the 1960s.
But for this episode, I'm going to be talking about Bill Evans as a solo pianist as well
(03:01):
as a pianist who used multi-tracking to record what he called conversations with myself.
In January 1963, he recorded an album called conversations with myself which consisted
of multi-track selections involving three separate piano tracks.
(03:23):
Actually one selection, Blue Monk, just had two piano tracks but the rest had three piano
tracks.
And the rhythmic subtleties that characterized his piano, bass and drums trio emerge on three
pianos with marvelous creative interplay throughout this album.
And what's amazing to me still is that no matter how thick the textures can get, nothing
(03:50):
ever ever sounds cluttered.
In 1967, Bill Evans recorded an album called further conversations with myself which only
involved two double-tracked pianos.
And it's a beautiful album in many ways.
Maybe it's not rhythmically as interesting as the three piano things from 1963.
(04:12):
And then in 1978, Bill Evans recorded an album called new conversations where he mixes and
matches going between two and three acoustic pianos although actually one of the pianos
is a Fender Rhodes electric piano.
So sometimes you have two acoustics and one electric or one acoustic with one electric
(04:34):
or you'll have two acoustic pianos.
And then he has one solo track which is a gorgeous interpretation of Duke Ellington's
song reflections in D. And I personally find the sound of the electric piano, the Fender
Rhodes piano, a little bit dated.
But I think that Bill Evans plans his textures and structures, his arrangements, perhaps
(05:01):
with less casualness than before and with more care.
And I can understand why he was especially proud of this album.
Bill Evans also recorded two solo piano albums.
The best known of the two is his 1968 release titled Alone.
And the way that he puts these five songs together almost feels like a suite in terms
(05:27):
of what the song selections are as well as his choice of keys.
So the songs on side one, we're thinking about the LP format, are Here's That Rainy Day,
A Time for Love, Midnight Mood, and On a Clear Day You Can See Forever.
And the second side is just one song.
(05:49):
It's an extended improvisation on the song Never Let Me Go.
It lasts about 15 minutes.
The playing goes between subtle introspection and unfettered linear improvisation.
And the mood is both exploratory and controlled at the same time.
(06:11):
In 1975, Bill recorded an album called Alone Again.
I find this release less persuasive, although it's more spontaneous and much looser in
regard to how Bill just dives into playing one improvised chorus after another on the
(06:32):
touch of your lips, in your own sweet way, make someone happy, and what kind of fool
am I.
But then he plays the song People, you know, that song by Sammy Kahn and Julie Stein from
the musical Funny Girl that Barbra Streisand made famous.
You know, people, people who need people.
(06:53):
Forgive my singing.
And basically, Bill just plays the melody over and over and over again.
First he plays it in the key of B flat, and then he plays it in the key of E major, and
then he goes back to B flat, then he goes back to E major, and he just does this over
and over and over again.
And he doesn't improvise at all.
(07:14):
It's basically just stating the melody, and he changes the harmonizations a little bit,
not too much, and the nuances of phrasing, but perhaps it's too much of a good thing.
I've put links in this episode description where one can get to these Bill Evans recordings,
(07:35):
as well as links to particular tracks that I especially love, such as the theme from
Spartacus from Conversations with Myself.
And I've also placed a link to an article that I wrote about my working relationship
with Bill Evans.
He arranged that I could be both the editor and transcriber for a book of his piano solos,
(07:59):
where I transcribed the music directly from the recordings.
I did not know Bill Evans very well, I have to admit.
But we did have one long telephone working session on the book.
And we would always talk whenever I'd go hear him play at the Village Vanguard.
And he even drove me home once to my apartment years and years ago.
(08:25):
And apropos to what we usually talk about on the piano maven, Bill Evans had a thorough
knowledge of the standard repertoire.
He was totally classically trained.
By all accounts, he was supposed to be an amazing sight reader.
I never saw that firsthand, but everyone I know who witnessed Bill sight reading said
(08:49):
that he could really play anything up to tempo, especially things like the Rachmaninoff Preludes
or anything of Bach or Bartok.
I had a friend who attested to this, that he saw Bill sight read the first Boulez piano
sonata.
I'm not sure if my friend was telling the truth, but I would love that to be true.
(09:14):
But in any case, in one of my conversations with Bill, I remember very vividly that we
were talking about our mutual love of Rachmaninoff's own recordings as a pianist.
And I remember when I had that big working telephone meeting with Bill, I was living
in Queens in New York City.
(09:35):
I was roommates with the late producer and musicologist Alan Evans, who already at that
time was a serious scholar of historic piano recordings.
And when I was living at Alan's apartment that year, he would let me make tapes of his
78s.
This was long before compact discs, and this was a time when historic piano reissues on
(09:59):
LP were few and far between.
So I had reels and reels of tape of people like Alfred Courtauld and Ignaz Friedman,
Beno Moiseyevich, you name it, all the dead pianists.
And when I was on the phone with Bill when we were talking about Rachmaninoff, I couldn't
(10:20):
help but rant about my obsession and my growing tape collection.
And Bill happened to be aware of a lot of these pianists, and he said something like
he had some of these recordings as a child, I think.
Anyway, he was very open to my coming over to visit him in his apartment in Fort Lee,
(10:40):
New Jersey, where I could bring over some of these tapes.
But we never got around to setting up a date.
The idea was that he was going to be touring in Japan, I think, in the fall of 1980.
And then when he returned, I guess October, November, something like that, we'd get together.
(11:01):
But what I did not realize was that his health was markedly deteriorating.
And I didn't really notice this because Bill could put a very sober front up in public.
But I do remember when I went to see him play at the nightclub Fat Tuesday on September
(11:22):
9, 1980.
I remember he looked really awful.
His hair was long and shaggy.
He looked thinner than usual.
It looked like he hadn't slept in months.
And what I did not know is that he was compulsively doing cocaine, which hastened his demise.
(11:43):
He had a bleeding ulcer and he had double pneumonia, but the cocaine certainly wasn't
helping.
Still, he played fantastically, and he was even talking to the audience, which was something
I never had experienced with him in a club setting.
Usually when I heard him at the Vanguard, he would just play and we would just have
(12:04):
to guess what the songs were.
Anyway, I could not approach Bill that night at Fat Tuesday because basically his manager
Helen Keane was fending off fans.
And I sense she was doing that because Bill's health was much more fragile than the situation
appeared to be.
(12:24):
And he canceled the engagement after playing the following night, and then he died less
than a week later on September 15.
It's so funny that my memories of hearing and interacting with Bill Evans remained so
vivid all these years later.
I guess I didn't really go into the nuts and bolts of details in terms of what makes these
(12:48):
solo recordings and multi-tracked recordings so special.
But you do have the links to listen.
And at a certain point, I'll have to devote another episode to the evolution of Bill Evans'
various trios and go into much greater detail because I have a lot to say about this because
(13:10):
I've been living with his music for such a long time.
And he's a musician that everyone should really get to know.
I can tell you that just about every classical pianist I know reveres Bill Evans.
This is Jed Dissler, and you've been listening to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast
(13:30):
guide to piano recordings.
Thank you so much for being with me, and I look forward to us being together for the
next episode.
This is Jed Dissler, and welcome to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano
(00:14):
recordings.
You can subscribe to the Piano Maven podcast through my sub stack page by clicking on the
link in the episode description.
Paid subscribers get bonuses such as Piano Maven Zoom meetings, where we share listening
experiences and meet special guests.
So please consider subscribing to help us reach out further into the piano community
(00:37):
and to keep this podcast in production throughout the year.
I haven't done a jazz episode in a while, and I've promised some of our subscribers
that I would be talking more about jazz piano on these episodes.
The influence of Bill Evans on modern jazz piano cannot be underestimated.
(00:58):
Certainly the main influences that he brought to his style came from Bud Powell, Horace
Silver, Lenny Tristano, and George Shearing, and also Milt Buckner in certain ways, especially
with the locked hands chord technique, playing parallel chords in both hands with the melody
on top.
(01:18):
However, Bill Evans' own way of voicing chords and his own way of building improvised lines
was totally original and his style helped pave the way for pianists like Herbie Hancock,
Chick Corea, and Keith Jarrett, and countless others.
Perhaps the most startling innovation that Bill Evans brought to the table, and it really
(01:43):
was a group innovation essentially, it was his approach to the classic jazz piano, bass,
and drums trio setting.
Or the Bill Evans Trio, bass and drums essentially were timekeepers providing a steady support
for whatever the piano was doing.
But with the trio that Bill Evans had with bassist Scott LeFaro and drummer Paul Modian,
(02:10):
each instrument became an equal partner.
You had continuous conversation where a bass line did not have to keep a steady walking
pattern but could break away instead from that and respond to piano lines with lines
of its own.
And the same went for the drums so that the beat was more implied than stated.
(02:35):
And this created a very mobile and flexible and fluid ensemble texture like improvised
chamber music.
And this kind of rhythm section concept began to manifest itself in the various Miles Davis
ensembles of the 1960s.
But for this episode, I'm going to be talking about Bill Evans as a solo pianist as well
(03:01):
as a pianist who used multi-tracking to record what he called conversations with myself.
In January 1963, he recorded an album called conversations with myself which consisted
of multi-track selections involving three separate piano tracks.
(03:23):
Actually one selection, Blue Monk, just had two piano tracks but the rest had three piano
tracks.
And the rhythmic subtleties that characterized his piano, bass and drums trio emerge on three
pianos with marvelous creative interplay throughout this album.
And what's amazing to me still is that no matter how thick the textures can get, nothing
(03:50):
ever ever sounds cluttered.
In 1967, Bill Evans recorded an album called further conversations with myself which only
involved two double-tracked pianos.
And it's a beautiful album in many ways.
Maybe it's not rhythmically as interesting as the three piano things from 1963.
(04:12):
And then in 1978, Bill Evans recorded an album called new conversations where he mixes and
matches going between two and three acoustic pianos although actually one of the pianos
is a Fender Rhodes electric piano.
So sometimes you have two acoustics and one electric or one acoustic with one electric
(04:34):
or you'll have two acoustic pianos.
And then he has one solo track which is a gorgeous interpretation of Duke Ellington's
song reflections in D. And I personally find the sound of the electric piano, the Fender
Rhodes piano, a little bit dated.
But I think that Bill Evans plans his textures and structures, his arrangements, perhaps
(05:01):
with less casualness than before and with more care.
And I can understand why he was especially proud of this album.
Bill Evans also recorded two solo piano albums.
The best known of the two is his 1968 release titled Alone.
And the way that he puts these five songs together almost feels like a suite in terms
(05:27):
of what the song selections are as well as his choice of keys.
So the songs on side one, we're thinking about the LP format, are Here's That Rainy Day,
A Time for Love, Midnight Mood, and On a Clear Day You Can See Forever.
And the second side is just one song.
(05:49):
It's an extended improvisation on the song Never Let Me Go.
It lasts about 15 minutes.
The playing goes between subtle introspection and unfettered linear improvisation.
And the mood is both exploratory and controlled at the same time.
(06:11):
In 1975, Bill recorded an album called Alone Again.
I find this release less persuasive, although it's more spontaneous and much looser in
regard to how Bill just dives into playing one improvised chorus after another on the
(06:32):
touch of your lips, in your own sweet way, make someone happy, and what kind of fool
am I.
But then he plays the song People, you know, that song by Sammy Kahn and Julie Stein from
the musical Funny Girl that Barbra Streisand made famous.
You know, people, people who need people.
(06:53):
Forgive my singing.
And basically, Bill just plays the melody over and over and over again.
First he plays it in the key of B flat, and then he plays it in the key of E major, and
then he goes back to B flat, then he goes back to E major, and he just does this over
and over and over again.
And he doesn't improvise at all.
(07:14):
It's basically just stating the melody, and he changes the harmonizations a little bit,
not too much, and the nuances of phrasing, but perhaps it's too much of a good thing.
I've put links in this episode description where one can get to these Bill Evans recordings,
(07:35):
as well as links to particular tracks that I especially love, such as the theme from
Spartacus from Conversations with Myself.
And I've also placed a link to an article that I wrote about my working relationship
with Bill Evans.
He arranged that I could be both the editor and transcriber for a book of his piano solos,
(07:59):
where I transcribed the music directly from the recordings.
I did not know Bill Evans very well, I have to admit.
But we did have one long telephone working session on the book.
And we would always talk whenever I'd go hear him play at the Village Vanguard.
And he even drove me home once to my apartment years and years ago.
(08:25):
And apropos to what we usually talk about on the piano maven, Bill Evans had a thorough
knowledge of the standard repertoire.
He was totally classically trained.
By all accounts, he was supposed to be an amazing sight reader.
I never saw that firsthand, but everyone I know who witnessed Bill sight reading said
(08:49):
that he could really play anything up to tempo, especially things like the Rachmaninoff Preludes
or anything of Bach or Bartok.
I had a friend who attested to this, that he saw Bill sight read the first Boulez piano
sonata.
I'm not sure if my friend was telling the truth, but I would love that to be true.
(09:14):
But in any case, in one of my conversations with Bill, I remember very vividly that we
were talking about our mutual love of Rachmaninoff's own recordings as a pianist.
And I remember when I had that big working telephone meeting with Bill, I was living
in Queens in New York City.
(09:35):
I was roommates with the late producer and musicologist Alan Evans, who already at that
time was a serious scholar of historic piano recordings.
And when I was living at Alan's apartment that year, he would let me make tapes of his
78s.
This was long before compact discs, and this was a time when historic piano reissues on
(09:59):
LP were few and far between.
So I had reels and reels of tape of people like Alfred Courtauld and Ignaz Friedman,
Beno Moiseyevich, you name it, all the dead pianists.
And when I was on the phone with Bill when we were talking about Rachmaninoff, I couldn't
(10:20):
help but rant about my obsession and my growing tape collection.
And Bill happened to be aware of a lot of these pianists, and he said something like
he had some of these recordings as a child, I think.
Anyway, he was very open to my coming over to visit him in his apartment in Fort Lee,
(10:40):
New Jersey, where I could bring over some of these tapes.
But we never got around to setting up a date.
The idea was that he was going to be touring in Japan, I think, in the fall of 1980.
And then when he returned, I guess October, November, something like that, we'd get together.
(11:01):
But what I did not realize was that his health was markedly deteriorating.
And I didn't really notice this because Bill could put a very sober front up in public.
But I do remember when I went to see him play at the nightclub Fat Tuesday on September
(11:22):
9, 1980.
I remember he looked really awful.
His hair was long and shaggy.
He looked thinner than usual.
It looked like he hadn't slept in months.
And what I did not know is that he was compulsively doing cocaine, which hastened his demise.
(11:43):
He had a bleeding ulcer and he had double pneumonia, but the cocaine certainly wasn't
helping.
Still, he played fantastically, and he was even talking to the audience, which was something
I never had experienced with him in a club setting.
Usually when I heard him at the Vanguard, he would just play and we would just have
(12:04):
to guess what the songs were.
Anyway, I could not approach Bill that night at Fat Tuesday because basically his manager
Helen Keane was fending off fans.
And I sense she was doing that because Bill's health was much more fragile than the situation
appeared to be.
(12:24):
And he canceled the engagement after playing the following night, and then he died less
than a week later on September 15.
It's so funny that my memories of hearing and interacting with Bill Evans remained so
vivid all these years later.
I guess I didn't really go into the nuts and bolts of details in terms of what makes these
(12:48):
solo recordings and multi-tracked recordings so special.
But you do have the links to listen.
And at a certain point, I'll have to devote another episode to the evolution of Bill Evans'
various trios and go into much greater detail because I have a lot to say about this because
(13:10):
I've been living with his music for such a long time.
And he's a musician that everyone should really get to know.
I can tell you that just about every classical pianist I know reveres Bill Evans.
This is Jed Dissler, and you've been listening to the Piano Maven, your friendly podcast
(13:30):
guide to piano recordings.
Thank you so much for being with me, and I look forward to us being together for the
next episode.
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