Beethoven to McCoy Tyner: Best jazz pianist?

[John Watt]

Good morning! I'm beginning this hoping to learn from musicians with more of a classical experience than myself.
Hearing McCoy Tyner with John Coltrane when I was younger, to seeing and talking with him in 1974, and listening to him now,
makes him one of my most important musicians.
There are Beethoven pieces he wrote that I want to listen to, a really small category for me, written music,
but I've heard he was one of the last great symphonic hall composers to improvise his solos.
You can see that in his charts, and he gave some instruments solo room too.

His fame has also grown to enable him to be a modern "one-name" artist.

McCoy Tyner has albums, okay, c.d.'s, that are orchestral, so he's not totally spontaneous, combo jazz.
Evidently, Beethoven was compositional and improvisational.

Is this true, and how far does this go?
Ludwig Beethoven, jamming out on piano during one of his symphonies.
I wish I could hear that.
Could Mr. Tyner do a remake of "Moonlight Sonata".
I'd want to be there to hear him start off with that.

What would that be? Modern jazz? And back then, was Beethoven the jazz?

Fretting fingers want to know.

 

[Corno Dolce]

Hi John Watt,

When McCoy Tyner studied at the Granoff School of Music in Philadelphia he played lots of Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, and Bach. So, he knows the classical structure.
Yes, Beethoven was compositional and improvisational. Listen to how he masterfully created his 9th Symphony and introduced the Chorus to that work. It was a major scandal at the time but people came around and got to know his genius. Think of how he wrote the Symphony with open fifths in the beginning so that nobody knew if it was in a major or minor key and so on and so forth........

However, according to the conductor Leonard Bernstein JSBach was the first Jazz Musician although some might say Buxtehude came before - No worries who came first........
Of course, Tyner could easily do a remake of the "Moonlight". Tyner is probably the most well-schooled of Jazz musicians known. Imnsho, McCoy singlehandedly "rewrote" the Jazz Scene. What he pioneered was light-years ahead of everyone else. Of course, he got a lot of influence from Coltrane but McCoy has a such a unique musician's muse - Its simply too impossible to for anyone to become just like McCoy - Many have tried although, but, as they say, No Cigar.............I fully understand why McCoy broke away from Coltrane - McCoy is a Titan in the Jazz Music World, you just cannot contain such "energy" - Its like a Hydrogen Bomb going off - Just bend over and kiss your a** goodbye - Yep, When McCoy leaves this transitory life the world will be much poorer for it.

So, bottom line is: McCoy is tops.............He could be the most perfect candidate to do remakes of all the most important composers since Bach - I would personally fancy hearing him do a remake of Rach's 3rd Piano Concerto.

 

[John Watt]

Corno Dolce! Thank you. If Leonard Bernstein can see jazz in Bach, my own understanding is vindicated.
And I understand the majestic "Rach" being of interest to you, for a McCoy Tyner interpretation.

I've been thinking about him a lot lately, feeling sad to see recent videos, Mr. Tyner looking gaunt and stressed. It makes me wonder what it's like, having to be as great as he is, for a living, every day, every association. As a non-smoker, non-drinker, for me it was easy to travel in a country band or a small bar band, just to get around. No-one was onto me about being like Jimi Hendrix, when I was using less and smaller equipment, and the country scene has always been more about family, not just adult behavior.

I can see McCoy Tyner being part of a pop musical revue, just doing a back-up gig,
having a good time with singers and other musicians, and the whole, non-genius atmosphere,
almost like he's hanging out with his grandchildren onstage. That's always a happy time.
Sometimes you just need to hang out and get along, and feel the energies off other performers,
instead of always having to be the ultimate inspiration.

Now that I'm aware of his formal education and his classical background, I'm more impressed.
That's not what I would have expected, seeing jazzers as rising from live band performances,
more a product of their own scene, and that's not how McCoy Tyner acted, just being very open and honest.

I'm of two minds here, if there is a choice between Beethoven and McCoy Tyner.
For sure, I'd love to be in the presence of McCoy Tyner to hear him play again.
But if I have to listen to just one piano piece, a Beethoven composition would be first.
McCoy Tyner, playing "Naima" as he did on "Echoes of a Friend", might be next.

It's always a tough call for a string bender like me, evaluating string strikers.

 

[Corno Dolce]

Ya know, thanx to video sites where people have uploaded performances, many people are discovering what giants there are now and before. I tell people that they should sample some of McCoy Tyner - They say: Who dat? I send them a link and they get real amazed. There's like a "glass ceiling" that inhibits people from crossing over to experience artistry on a grand scale like McCoy Tyner.

McCoy had some really serious fights with health problems a few years ago. I perceive he had a heart problem that got surgically rectified and he also lost a lot of weight after doctors intervened. That he still is out there and "musicizing" is wonderful but it does take its toll. They say that Pres. Theodore Roosevelt was sleeping when Death took him, because if he was awake there would have been a fight. They found an open book under his pillow. Despite Roosevelt's health issues he kept on working and self-improving - Its whats called the Law of Process. McCoy is one tough cookie - He won't be put down like a feral dog.

 

[John Watt]

Oooh, thanks again! I didn't type as much as I could have, not wanting to reference the usual drug thing, even if that's what I was thinking. Heart problems? They must have been big ones. A feral dog? I've got to watch out for a new pack out in the woods along the Niagara River, led by two German Shephards.

What I remember about President Theodore Roosevelt is how much they used t.v. tricks to cover up his illness, something they didn't think the American public would accept. I'm glad attitudes for caregivers and responders are more understanding now.

Your "glass ceiling" concept is reflecting off the one in my brain, the one that keeps me from getting into more of what's happening all around me, what keeps me thinking about myself and what I'm doing, how I'd play it, how I'd paint it. And that's a serious admission, girlfriends in the past thinking I'm cold, not jealous, not greedy, too distant for them. I never felt that way, and maybe that's my glass ceiling. Hmmm! Music is always there for me, art too, but it takes a lot for me to want to make something of it myself. It fixes me in time, it reveals the totality of my expression, and that's usually a little disappointing, not having it all together as I'd like.

If I listened to the untitled Frederik Magle a lot here, I'd feel too intimidated, and my posting would dry up, not that my Jimi-lovin'n'playin' self would be missed too much. But then, even in real life, if I'm enchanted by a band or performer I like to stand back and relax and just pay attention, enjoying myself. There's a few places I go where no-one knows me as a musician or mayoral candidate, and that's virgin territory for me, precious. I gotta get out there soon.

Maybe something that shows my below glass ceiling is my recent excitement here, in Welland. One of the submarines the Canadian navy has decomissioned came through the Seaway. I rode my bike along the canal that day, hoping to see it passing by on the barge, but no. I rode my bike to Port Colborne, hoping to see it tied up before it went around the lake to the scrapyard, but it wasn't there. I phoned the scrapyard, explaining what I was thinking, but was told no, I can't go aboard, and call back for a price.

All I wanted to do was get a wire that I could use as part of the grounding from this submarine. I've been making acoustic sounds with my new guitar that sound like marine mammal frequencies, even different emotions, for me, and joke about getting a bass player who can humpback me up on bass. Thinking this wire was deep below the surface, probably passing by whales on the east coast in the Atlantic, yeah, "Atlantis", by McCoy Tyner, got me going. I'll keep trying. And that's all a happy thought, close to home, Canadian. That's better than a lifetime of thinking I'll visit Beethoven's museum and slice a piece of his piano for an inlay, when I don't have the ability to get there. Uh, any help?