Art at Its Finest

Elegiac Cycles (Warner Bros., 1999) - Brad Mehldau's first solo piano effort - makes one wonder whether five stars are really enough. If I was forced to describe it in a single word, I would probably choose "astounding," but neither it, nor its many synonyms, can even come close to describing the album. The nine Mehldau originals which comprise the record all vaguely revolve around the theme of death, or, more generally, loss, and are so thoroughly inspired and beautiful that even the harshest critics who have accused him of being "much more clever than profound" will undoubtedly relent upon hearing them. The tunes also can't help but resurrect the age-old question of what is jazz.

The album opens up with "Bard," a short etude that could have easily come from the quill of Satie and contains no detectable improvisation. This is followed by "Resignation" - my personal favorite - a dark, hauntingly beautiful piece which builds into a remarkable solo but contains no blues-based harmonies or phrases and nothing even remotely resembling swing. The piece is full of chords and swells worthy of the best Romantic composers (for whom Mehldau professes a love in the liner notes). The pianist's remarkable left-hand skills, for which he has justly earned himself a renown, had me shaking my head in disbelief. The next track, "Memory's Tricks," once again starts out with a theme that, at least to these ears, lies somewhere between Chopin and Debussy (although Mehldau himself claims Beethoven as a primary influence), but otherwise is an extended (over nine minutes) improvisation that is angular, frantic, disturbing and unceasingly passionate.

Only on the fourth track, "Elegy for William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg," does the music begin to sound like jazz, or at least what most casual and some not-so-casual listeners expect jazz to sound like. There is more than a little blues and a touch of swing, which is appropriate for the occasion, given the Beat Movement's fascination with bebop. This segues into a short version of "Lament for Linus" - interesting to hear and compare with a much longer version Mehldau recorded with his trio on his Art of the Trio, Vol. I. Any traditional-sounding jazz ends here, however. "Trailer Park Ghost" - the significance of the title will probably remain known ony to Mehldau himself - is another extended improvisation that borders on what some have termed "instant composition." It is more - much more - than simply scales played over chords. There are modulations, time signature changes and every other advanced musical device one can think of, all created, to the best of my ability to hear and interpret them, on the spot.

Mehldau takes the extended improvisation medium even further in "Goodbye Storyteller," the album's longest track at just under ten and a half minutes. Here, a bit of Beethoven is apparent in the intro, while the solo is a masterful example of improvising on a theme. The piece is perhaps the most brooding and contemplative of the bunch and was undoubtedly inspired by a personal experience in Mehldau's life. "Ruckblick" - another mysterious title - reintroduces the theme from "Resignation" towards the end, completing a cycle that the album title refers to. Mehldau closes the record with "The Bard Returns" - a restatement of the opening number as the title indicates, but more developed this time, with a succinct solo, thus completing the final elegiac cycle of the work.

Not to be missed are the liner notes, written by Mehldau himself, where he explains his fascination with elegies and, more generally, ruminates on the subject of mortality, art and the lasting influence of the Romantic movement. Pretentious, some might say, but the artists among us will understand his desire to write about these topics much like we will understand, with fascination, the beautiful music Mehldau has created.