Recorded live in the 80s, with ecstatic applause left in for proof, this is one of two ECM releases marking Keith Jarrett’s 70th. The other is a subdued collection called Creation; both are miles from the pianist’s best – those monumental slow-builds of the early trio albums, or the revelatory vistas of solo concerts in Cologne and Paris. Jarrett can do the nimble fingerwork and spry attack required by Barber and Bartók, and it’s easy to hear why he gravitated to these jazz-attuned composers. But the results still end up sounding mostly like Jarrett. His way with rhythm – spiky, pliant – works for the opening of Bartók’s Third Concerto, but Barber’s concerto has none of the colour gradations of a Jarrett great. The New Japan Philharmonic Orchestra under Kazuyoshi Akiyama is gung-ho in Bartók; Dennis Russell Davies and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Saarbrücken never quite relax into Barber’s softer-grained textures. The disc ends with the five-minute Tokyo Encore: pure Jarrett, where he sounds most comfortable.
