![]() Given that situation, it was no wonder that the pianist was ready to call it a day. To cap it all, his condition was exacerbated by the exhausting five-hour, 350-mile drive he made to Cologne from a concert he’d given in Zurich. He had been suffering from excruciating back pain for several days, a result of which was a run of sleepless nights. Making matters worse, Jarrett was not in good shape. When he was given the news that there was no time to get a replacement piano, Jarrett threatened to cancel the show. To make matters worse, it was a piano used for opera rehearsals and was in abject condition and badly out of tune.įor a renowned perfectionist such as Jarrett, who was fastidious about his pianos and possessed perfect pitch, the instrument was an abomination. Unfortunately, the opera house staff wheeled out the wrong piano – a much smaller Bösendorfer baby grand. ![]() Listen to The Köln Concert on Apple Music and Spotify.Ī young German student and part-time promoter called Vera Brandes – an avid jazz fan who was just 17 at the time – was responsible for organizing the concert and, at Jarrett’s request, had arranged for a Bösendorfer 290 Imperial concert grand piano to be provided for the show. Though The Köln Concert quickly went on to become regarded as a classic and amassed sales of four million (to date, it’s still the best-selling piano album of all time), remarkably, the concert almost never happened. Fortunately, the concert was recorded for posterity by ECM Records, who released the recording later that year as a double-album housed in stylish black-and-white artwork adorned with a picture of an Afro-topped Jarrett hunched over the piano. ![]() January 24, 1975, proved a memorable, magical night for the 1,300 people that witnessed American jazz pianist Keith Jarrett perform a solo recital in the majestic surroundings of Cologne’s opera house.
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