RIP Stanley Cowell
An intellectual but accessible jazz great passes.
The generation of jazz musicians who began their careers in the 60’s and 70’s (like McCoy Tyner) have begun to pass away, but often without having achieved the recognition of their predecessors — perhaps because their music is harder to categorize. Some of the names for the directions these musicians explored suggest that they’re defined by the past (“post bop” or “hard bop”); other names imply these musicians have no sense of the past at all (“free jazz”).
Musicians like Stanley Cowell (obituary from the Washington Post) tended to see their playing not as a discrete moment on a timeline, but as an opportunity to pose a question. When you listen to Cowell, you don’t think something like “What I’m hearing follows (or differs from) X from the past” but “What I’m hearing answers what I just heard a moment ago, and asks a new question.” Chris Richards’ Washington Post profile recalls
Cowell told me he preferred to approach the piano with curiosity and immediacy. “One note follows the next,” he said.
You don’t have to know jazz history to appreciate Cowell, but you have to train yourself to listen without preconceptions. Follow the music and see where it takes you. Although “Equipoise” below is pleasant enough, if you use it as background music, you’ll miss the point.
