Michel Petrucciani

Michel Petrucciani – Solo in Denmark (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/48 kHz | Time – 55:35 minutes | 587 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Storyville Records

Michel was one of the most popular pianists in the 1990’s due to his extraordinary technique, his astounding musical outlook and extremely dynamic playing style. His music is simply timeless and magical, seemingly coming straight from his soul. As he is often quoted: “I’m not playing to your head, but to your soul. When I play, I’m like a bird flying over the landscape, and I can land anywhere.”
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Michel Petrucciani – Colors (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:36:54 minutes | 561 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Disques Dreyfus

This is a superb retrospective, despite his very considerable physical disabilities, of one of the very greatest piano jazz masters in the late twentieth century. There are ten studio and eight live recordings captured during a period of high productivity between 1994 and 1997. All the tunes are composed by the pianist who we hear in solo, duo, trio and sextet modes. The French musician was born on 28th December 1962 at Orange, in the south of the country. He suffered from Osteogenesis Imperfecta, an inherited disease, from birth which causes brittle bones and sometimes, as in his case, a shortness of stature. Despite all, after being influenced by Duke Ellington in his early years he began his public musical career aged only thirteen. He worked out of Paris as a young adult before moving briefly to California in the early eighties, where he made three significant recordings with saxophonist Charles Lloyd, subsequently spending his latter days in New York. During his career he delivered thirty two albums as a leader and many others as a sideman. Despite his incapacity he was very much a ladies man with five significant relationships during his lifetime, producing one son who sadly inherited his condition. He died on 6th January 1999 in New York City aged 36 and was buried at the Le Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, one grave away from Fredric Chopin.
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Michel Petrucciani – Trio in Tokyo (Live) (1999/2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:10:44 minutes | 1,28 GB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Dreyfus Jazz

This 1997 recording features the late French pianist Michel Petrucciani and his trio of drummer Steve Gadd and bassist Anthony Jackson in performance at the Blue Note in Tokyo. The musicians might seem an unlikely team, as Petrucciani (who died in January 1999) was an unabashed romantic in the lyrical piano tradition that extends from Duke Ellington through Bill Evans and Keith Jarrett, while Gadd and Jackson are best known as masters of the contemporary studio groove. Yet they achieve an organic sense of swing, even if Jackson’s bass guitar lacks the rich wooden timbre of an acoustic instrument. From the Spanish-tinted “September Second” to the Evans-like “Home” to the closing cover of Miles Davis’s “So What,” Petrucciani’s playing is characterized by melodic clarity, percussive touch, and rhapsodic ecstasy in the pure act of improvisation. The term “happy jazz” is sometimes used pejoratively for facile, formulaic music. Trio in Tokyo proves you don’t have to be shallow to know the joy.
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Michel Petrucciani – Michel Petrucciani: The Montreux Years (Live) (2023)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/48 kHz | Time – 01:15:08 minutes | 832 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BMG Rights Management (UK) Ltd

Born in the South of France in 1962, Michel Petrucciani was diagnosed with osteogenesis imperfecta – or “glass bone disease” and only ever grew to 99cm. Despite his health condition, Petrucciani went on to become one of the most accomplished jazz pianists of his generation and became a musical prodigy.

At the age of 13, Petrucciani gave his first professional concert performance and became famous locally. However, the young star dreamed of America and in 1982 found himself in California where he met jazz saxophonist Charles Lloyd. In the 80s Petrucciani became the first European artist to sign with the American jazz label Blue Note Records, the most prolific, influential, and respected jazz label of the 20th century. It was at Blue Note Records where Petrucciani made seven albums including his acclaimed LP ‘Michel Plays Petrucciani’.

As well as his own remarkable solo career, Michel Petrucciani was a celebrated collaborator for some of music’s biggest artists, including Freddie Hubbard who invited him to join his All Star band. Overcoming physical disabilities to become a world-renowned pianist, Petrucciani was awarded the prestigious Prix Django Reinhardt in 1984 and during the same year his album ‘100 Hearts’ won a Grand Prix Du Disque, the French equivalent of a Grammy Award. In 1994 Petrucciani was made a knight by François Mitterrand, the French president at the time.

A collection of Petrucciani’s most memorable performances at The Montreux Jazz Festival from 1990 – 1998, fans of the legendary jazz pianist can relive some of his biggest recordings on Michel Petrucciani: The Montreux Years. Encapsulating his time at the festival, the release opens with 1997’s “35 Seconds of Music and More” and “Estate” from the 1982 album of the same name. Delving further into Petrucciani’s repertoire, Michel Petrucciani: The Montreux Years includes the 1991 hit “Rachid” and “Little Peace in C for U”.

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