Beethoven’s renown in his own day was not just as a composer but also as an improvising pianist. He wrote in a letter in July 1819 that “freedom, and to move forward is the purpose of the world of art, as it is of the whole of creation.’
So it is a paradox that his written compositions are seen by many as immutable holy writ, and the very idea that musicians of subsequent musicians might take liberties with them still seen as transgressive. Django Bates recently told me that “I went to a piano room during my second week (as a composition student at the Royal College of Music, shortly before abandoning the course), lifted the lid, and there was the sign on a brass plaque: 'no jazz to be played on this piano'.”
Into this fray steps an American musical celebrity, New Orleans-born Jon Batiste, 38 years old, garlanded with five Grammys and, as of last night 22 Grammy nominations, and about to take over from Lang Lang as the mentor in the popular UK TV show The Piano.
Beethoven Blues is a solo piano album. It consists of a sequence of some of Beethoven’s most popular pieces, as "reimagined" by Batiste. Plus one of Batiste’s own compositions, a theme from “American Symphony”; its presence on the album is not explained. And whereas Batiste is far from the first pianist to have used Beethoven works as a jumping off point for improvisation and individual expression, what is unusual is to find one whose profile and renown have led him to release it on a major label.
The way he describes how his approach has developed is that “I was drawn to be in conversation with Beethoven's music… To maintain the depth and complexity of the original composition while adding another layer of contemporary musicality feels conversational. It's as if Beethoven and I are collaborating. ”
To that purpose he starts and finishes with “Für Elise”. It is the opener and lead single of the album. Batiste takes a phrase of Beethoven, and answers and contrasts it with a minor, bluesy jazz phrase of his own. It all feels a bit contrived; there are deeper and more natural ways to improvise over Beethoven. The musical material of “Für Elise” already carries promise: a flat five in its first phrase, and an opening harmonic sequence which oscillates between the minor chord on the one and the dominant chord on the five in the same way as, say “Take Five”. The final track, a more extensive “Reverie” on the same piece works better.
The Allegretto movement of the Seventh Symphony has proved a happy hunting ground for previous generations of improvising musicians, not least because the melody is sparse and leaves so much room. Jacques Loussier, for example, enlivens it and lightens it with syncopation. In a remarkable version on his solo album Touch the Light, Joachim Kühn achieves deep and full expression and an achieves miracles pacing and flow. Batiste goes all out for contrast by working cleverly with the theme and variations form, but there is some uncomfortably abruptly choppy pedalling. “Ode to Joyful” doesn’t have much to say in its two minutes, and I couldn’t help thinking that Jason Moran, Dudley Moore or Iiro Rantala might have brought more humour and less of a heavy stomp to “Waldstein Wobble”.
There will be more: the new release is subtitled “Batiste Piano Series Vol. 1”. It will be interesting to hear what comes next.
