However Sony Masterworks and
Zenph Sound Innovations managed to do it, and I'll do my best to try to explain
it, the release of Unmistakable a collection of what they
are calling "re-performances" by deceased jazz piano virtuoso Oscar
Peterson has produced some remarkably fine music. The great Oscar Peterson died in December of
2007 at the age of 82 after a long productive career, so while the album makes
use of some of his unreleased recordings made in the '70's and 80's, it is not
Peterson who is doing the "re-performing." What we have here is the result of the
application of modern technology to artistic innovation, and if this is any
example of what the technology is capable of, there will be a lot more coming.
Those readers only interested in
good music played brilliantly and not much concerned with how it was recorded
and those who think the whole thing is just too spooky can skip ahead to the
next paragraph. According to the Zenph
publicity, the company "uses computer software to transform recorded music
back into live performances, replicating what was originally played but with
vastly improved sound quality. They
start with video recordings as well as some privately recorded performances. Then as their website describes it: "We transform musical performance into data and then render it
into sound, which can be used in completely new ways. Our proprietary platform
expresses musical performance as malleable data. Rendered from this data, audio
content is liberated from “frozen” recordings—creating immersive and
interactive capabilities comparable to those of high‐resolution
computer graphics." I
leave it to you to decipher what that may mean.
What you see
if you are in the room with the piano is the various keys moving as if being
struck by invisible fingers. What you
hear is some very fine music. The piano is programmed to play the particular
piece just as it was played by the original performer. . Zenph has already used this technology to
create re-performances by Rachmaninoff, Glenn Gould and jazz legend Art Tatum. Of course, exactly how this is accomplished is
still Zenph's little proprietary secret Had the technology existed back in the
day, we could have re-performances of Mozart, Beethoven or Franz Liszt.
At any rate,
while Peterson was still alive back in 2007 representatives of the company met
with him to show him how their system worked.
At the time they used the recorded re-performances of Peterson's idol,
Art Tatum, to let him hear what their
process sounded like, and "hearing his hero playing live again after all
the ensuing years brought Peterson to tears." It impressed him enough that he spent the
afternoon working with the team from the company and listening to some
re-performances of his own playing.
After
Peterson's death his wife helped with the selection of songs for this album. Of
all the material made available to the team, they selected performances from
two different concerts: a mid '70's concert at the Eastman Theatre in Rochester,
NY and a 1980's concert from Munich.
They also used a performance from the CBC TV series Oscar
Peterson and Friends. The
actual recording contains 16 re-performances, eight in stereo and the same
eight repeated in binaural stereo for earphones. It is as beautiful a recording of solo piano jazz as
you are likely to hear.
The songs are
all classics. The album begins with
"Body and Soul" and a signature speeding romp through "Back Home
Again in Indiana." It ends with the
Benny Goodman theme, "Goodbye."
In between there is a Duke Ellington medley that starts with "Take
the A Train" and includes "In a Sentimental Mood," "C Jam Blues," "Lady of the Lavender
Mist" and "Satin Doll" among others. Gershwin's "The Man I Love,"
Anthony Newly and Leslie Bricusse's "Who Can I Turn To," Victor Young's
"When I Fall in Love," and Dizzy Gillespie's "Con Alma"
round out a very strong album.
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