Rescued piano-trio sets: Bill Evans and Michel Petrucciani

My first exposure to the remarkable French pianist Michel Petrucciani was a record marking his early
outburst onto the international jazz scene as a member of the Charles Lloyd Quartet in Montreux, Switzerland, in 1982. 

Despite the rapport with audiences Lloyd had dependably, I never warmed to his playing, which seemed a bit like John Coltrane watered down for jazz-curious hippies.

It takes an assertive pianist to carve out a firm profile in any quartet led by a saxophonist (classic case in point: McCoy Tyner with Coltrane). The freedom Petrucciani displays in this two-disc set takes the form of a loosened, more expansive style that eliminates the need to compete in facility and impact with anyone else on the bandstand. 

The pianist's performance on this gig displays the torrential energy typical of his playing, his strong hands belying the fragility of his body, which was hobbled by a brittle-bones disease (osteogenesis imperfecta) that subjected him to frequent injury and limited his adult height to about three feet. With the condition's vulnerability to respiratory disease, Petrucciani survived only to the age of 36.

I'm grateful now to sample what he was able to achieve as he matured in this country and the breadth he  could display heading a piano trio. That's with the release of "Kuumbwa" (Elemental Music Records), one of the latest in the history of discovered performances made available to the jazz public by Zev Feldman. The title comes from the name of a nonprofit jazz institution in Santa Cruz, California, where the trio played in May 1987.

Petrucciani's mates on the bandstand here are formidable: bassist Dave Holland and drummer Eliot Zigmund. This combo was captured at Kuumbwa on its only tour, and its performance shows the pianist to be a generous bandleader: Holland gets lots of solos, and is very well recorded throughout. 

A graceful composer himself, Petrucciani responds well to standards in this selection. He probes a chestnut like "My Funny Valentine" insightfully, his ideas about it showing lyrical variety with points of emphasis along the way. Holland follows in the same spirit, reflective and poised against sparsely distributed piano chords. Zigmund makes the most of fewer solo opportunities, but remains a forceful, supportive presence. The mounting intensity of his solo on "Autumn Leaves" helps anchor the bassist's and pianist's free flights. 

When Petrucciani begins a piece unaccompanied, the introduction is always inviting and fresh, as in the original "Mike P. Blues" and the evergreen "Stella by Starlight." His inspiration runs high and embraces the pixieish. Though not prone to drop quotations into his solos, he evokes one familiar phrase of "La Marseillaise" in his composition "Limbo" as if to present a calling card from his native France. 

The other new Elemental Music release, also available on Record Store Day (April 18) is "Bill Evans at the BBC." The influential pianist was recorded for a broadcast in BBC's Jazz625 series on March 19, 1965. His trio at the time consisted of the smoothly supportive and often inspired bassist Chuck Israels and drummer Larry Bunker. 

The on-air host of the broadcast was the English musician and radio personality Humphrey Lyttelton, whose respectful, lively introduction of the musicians sets the tone for a couple of sets, mostly of Great American Songbook interpretations. The studio audience applauds heartily, but somewhat according to the strait-laced English stereotype. 

Unfortunately, the piano sound is never first-rate, the only disappointment in this release. The norm of recording jazz piano, especially by one of the world's leading broadcasters, was higher in 1965 than this recording indicates. The trio sound on the whole is more than adequate, however. 

No pianist in the modern era responded more thoughtfully to standards than Evans, whose interpretations of "Someday My Prince Will Come," the Disney song perhaps most cherished by jazzmen, "My Foolish Heart," and "How Deep Is the Ocean" are memorable. Fitting its inspiration in nature, "How Deep Is the Ocean" has a good Evans solo  that's sometimes flowing, sometimes choppy. 

A particular benefit of Evans' manner of soloing is that he could be spontaneous without turning abrupt or offhand about ending his turn in the spotlight. It was never a matter of "I guess that's all I have to say" with the equivalent of a shoulder shrug. The solos tend to seem finished and rounded off even when the improvisation sounds thoroughly fresh and natural. 

His introductions, unaccompanied and "rubato" (used in jazz to mean out of tempo, often before any regular pulse is established), are inspired and worth reveling in for the listener. You're charmed by "Come Rain or Come Shine" on this disc well before the trio converges on the song in a relaxed 4/4.

Of the sidemen, Israels is particularly sympathetic to the Evans approach. His style is never a spate of note-spinning, whatever lavish attention he devotes to his solos. Often he reflects the boss's melody-centered approach, as in "Come Rain or Come Shine." His note in the booklet celebrating his time with Evans is reinforced by how well he plays on the disc.

With Bunker providing the rhythmic foundation, this release represents Evans at his strongest, despite some lack of crispness in how the piano is represented.