What is your favorite instrument?

For me it has to be the piano - just such a versatile instrument.

To me the best sound in the whole wide world is that of a piano, double bass, drums trio - fab.

Adrian

Instrument: sarod
Composer/musician: Ali Akbar Khan
Favourite record: can't remember...

quote:

Originally posted by Expat in Oz:
For me it has to be the piano - just such a versatile instrument.

To me the best sound in the whole wide world is that of a piano, double bass, drums trio - fab.

Adrian

So who is your favorite piano trio? Is there anyone out there better than Bill Evans?

Don't really have one; as a guitarist I suppose I should be partisan, but it's just a part of the big picture. I will, therefore, take the liberty of mentioning an instrument which may only survive as digital sound samples in the future: the Mellotron.

This was the first sample-playback keyboard, the keys operating motors that pulled a strip of tape, with a recording of a single chromatic note, past a playback head. On the individual tapes could be anything, but most probably think of the Mellotron sound as the flutes beginning "Strawberry Fields Forever" or the string/orchestral sounds on Moody Blues albums. Even the "Spanish" intro to "Bungalow Bill" was a Mellotron key being pressed... to play back a tape of a Flamenco guitar player!

The 'Tron (because of the effect of the harder you pressed down the key, the closer the tape was to the head) had a spooky breathing quality to the sound that was magical. My absolute favourite pop records of the late-60's (Beatles, Moodies, early Traffic, King Crimson etc.) would not have had the same effect without the Mellotron.

Yeah, the piano & mellotron both do it for me. How about a hammond/leslie speaker combo. Thats been known to raise the hairs on the back of my neck both listening to & playing it. But arguably the greatest instrument hasto be the human voice?
matt.

quote:

Originally posted by HR:

quote:

Originally posted by Expat in Oz:
For me it has to be the piano - just such a versatile instrument.

To me the best sound in the whole wide world is that of a piano, double bass, drums trio - fab.

Adrian

So who is your favorite piano trio? Is there anyone out there better than Bill Evans?

Now that's a tough one. Bill Evans is good no doubt about it. Here are some of my favourite piano trios.

Enrico Pieranunzi Trio - in it's many different guises

Keith Jarrett Trio

Tord Gustavsen Trio

Peter Erskine Trio (with John Taylor and Palle Danielsson)

Esbjorn Svennson Trio

Prysm - French jazz trio who are excellent

Kenny Barron Trio

Vassilis Tsabropoulos/Arild Andersen/John Marshall

Marilyn Crispell Trio

Brad Mehldau Trio

Adrian

TE]

Now that's a tough one. Bill Evans is good no doubt about it. Here are some of my favourite piano trios.

Enrico Pieranunzi Trio - in it's many different guises

Keith Jarrett Trio

Tord Gustavsen Trio

Peter Erskine Trio (with John Taylor and Palle Danielsson)

Esbjorn Svennson Trio

Prysm - French jazz trio who are excellent

Kenny Barron Trio

Vassilis Tsabropoulos/Arild Andersen/John Marshall

Marilyn Crispell Trio

Brad Mehldau Trio

Adrian[/QUOTE

Thanks Adrian.
I am not familiar with the Pieranuzi, the Svenson and the Prysm trios. I will check them out. Next week I am going to listen to Laurence Hobgood Trio in Evanston Illinois.
Regards, Haim

My favourite instrument is without doubt drums. Drums are the key intrument to rythm and so I guess also this intrument is favoured by Naim. I also like trumpet quite and I think more rock group should use it (like e.g. Morphine). I love the trumpet in jazz music.

quote:

Originally posted by HR:
TE]

Now that's a tough one. Bill Evans is good no doubt about it. Here are some of my favourite piano trios.

Enrico Pieranunzi Trio - in it's many different guises

Keith Jarrett Trio

Tord Gustavsen Trio

Peter Erskine Trio (with John Taylor and Palle Danielsson)

Esbjorn Svennson Trio

Prysm - French jazz trio who are excellent

Kenny Barron Trio

Vassilis Tsabropoulos/Arild Andersen/John Marshall

Marilyn Crispell Trio

Brad Mehldau Trio

Adrian[/QUOTE

Thanks Adrian.

I am not familiar with the Pieranuzi, the Svenson and the Prysm trios. I will check them out. Next week I am going to listen to Laurence Hobgood Trio in Evanston Illinois.
Regards, Haim

Haim -

Enrico Pieranunzi has released a lot of music - I would try the newish one with Joey Baron and Narc Johnson called Current Condition, also Seaward - the first two tracks are marvellous, The Chant of Time, The Night Gone by.....

Prysm - try Second Rhythm and Live CD

Esbjorn Svensson Trio or EST - a bit more adventurous - try Seven Days of Falling, Good Morning Suzie Soho, Strange Place for Snow

Enjoy Laurence Hobgood.

Adrian

quote:

Originally posted by Expat in Oz:

quote:

Originally posted by HR:
TE]

Now that's a tough one. Bill Evans is good no doubt about it. Here are some of my favourite piano trios.

Enrico Pieranunzi Trio - in it's many different guises

Keith Jarrett Trio

Tord Gustavsen Trio

Peter Erskine Trio (with John Taylor and Palle Danielsson)

Esbjorn Svennson Trio

Prysm - French jazz trio who are excellent

Kenny Barron Trio

Vassilis Tsabropoulos/Arild Andersen/John Marshall

Marilyn Crispell Trio

Brad Mehldau Trio

Adrian[/QUOTE

Thanks Adrian.

I am not familiar with the Pieranuzi, the Svenson and the Prysm trios. I will check them out. Next week I am going to listen to Laurence Hobgood Trio in Evanston Illinois.
Regards, Haim

Haim -

Enrico Pieranunzi has released a lot of music - I would try the newish one with Joey Baron and Narc Johnson called Current Condition, also Seaward - the first two tracks are marvellous, The Chant of Time, The Night Gone by.....

Prysm - try Second Rhythm and Live CD

Esbjorn Svensson Trio or EST - a bit more adventurous - try Seven Days of Falling, Good Morning Suzie Soho, Strange Place for Snow

Enjoy Laurence Hobgood.

Adrian

Thanks a lot,
Haim

Haim - just found a new Enrico Pieraninzi CD out with Charlie Haden and Paul Motian.

Listen to some tracks at

http://www.camoriginalsoundtracks.com/default.asp?site=camjazz&idmenu=1&path=cd&idcd=409

Sounds beautiful.

Adrian

quote:

Is there anyone out there better than Bill Evans?

None.

voice

When I was very young it was the recorder.
When I was still young but pretending to be grown-up it was the clarinet.
When finally allowed temper tantrums and spots it became the Violin.
When legally allowed to grow a beard (in my own time) it became the classical guitar.
On reaching half of a great age I re-discovered the recorder.
As I gently matured further it became the classical organ. A sort of contra-contra-bass recorder writ large?
It may be the last thing I ever hear....

Mine has to be the Harmonica without a doubt.
I love the harp too though and the mandolin is interesting.

Fave is probably the Chapman Stick. I've always tuned into bass above most things, and the Stick lets you play bass but doesn't restrict you to the low stuff to the same extent as a bass as you can play different things with each hand.

And it looks cooler than liquid helium!

Jim Lampi's "Greazy" on the naim label is a great Stick showcase with some cracking tunes and playing. Probably doesn't hurt that the musician with the talent I'd most like copied into my head, Tony Levin, knows his way round a Stick as well as just about any sort of bass you can shake a, errr, Stick at.

Pete.

For me it's the sax. Love them horns!

Mike

1. Guitar

2. Saxophone
3. Trumpet

On guitar:

1. Jimi Hendrix
2. Jerry Garcia
3. Jean-Paul Bourelly

I don't like the piano but I have loads of favourite (jazz) pianists - Cecil Taylor, Matthew Shipp, Marilyn Crispell, Horace Tapscott, Andrew Hill, Don Pullen, Geri Allen...

However, I don't like Keith Jarrett any more, so there.
Jim

Welcome to the club, Jim !

I'm sure Adrian will appreciate both your list of fav piano players and the fact that you're from "down under". For myself, I'd probably exchange Cecil Taylor (I'm just not intellectual enough for him - ever heard his CD with the "Italian Instabile Orchestra" ? Leaves me puzzled...) for Keith Jarrett (just went through his 6 CD box with live recordings - no cuts or dubs - in the "Blue Note" in NYC: Yummy !), but for the rest, I 100 percent agree with your list !

Good to see somebody following a similar "road".

Stefan

Bassoons and Contra bassoons. There's just something about the town band section of the 9th that gets me every time. I was chuffed as a kid to find out the technical term for the sound of a contrabassoon is a fart.

I would have loved to learn to play one, but the school only had two and they were spoken for. After a bassoon the oboe seemed girly so I gave it up.

B

Probably the string quartet - Beethoven, Haydn, Schubert, Bartok... oh and I'm very impressed with Maxwell Davis's new Naxos quartets.

EW

Roland TB303 / Hardfloor / Hardfloor / Acperience 5

DS