Listening to Misha Mengelberg play solo piano is like eavesdropping on a highly subversive mind at work. Everything is laid bare. Unlike Keith Jarrett, who endeavors to find a flow in solo-improvising, Mengelberg sets up expectations, then delights in sabotaging them. What starts out as a jaunty folk song of the sort one finds in a child's piano method book, "Koekoek" suddenly sprouts "wrong" notes, then collapses into crunching thumps. "Bill Evans in Dßn begins, appropriately, with an ocean...   [ read more ]

CD $16.13

Listening to Misha Mengelberg play solo piano is like eavesdropping on a highly subversive mind at work. Everything is laid bare. Unlike Keith Jarrett, who endeavors to find a flow in solo-improvising, Mengelberg sets up expectations, then delights in sabotaging them. What starts out as a jaunty folk song of the sort one finds in a child's piano method book, "Koekoek" suddenly sprouts "wrong" notes, then collapses into crunching thumps. "Bill Evans in Dßn begins, appropriately, with an ocean...   [ read more ]

SUPER-AUDIO CD $18.03

This 70th birthday tribute to Dutch pianist Misha Mengelberg opens with a track that appeared on the first album that he appeared on back in 1964, Eric Dolphy's Last Date (there it was entitled "Hypo Xmas Tree Fuzz"). The affectionate twiddle he inserts into the theme here is like a conniving wink to an old friend. On Senne Sing Song, his third John Zorn-produced trio album after 1994's Who's Bridge (Avant) and 1997's No Idea (DIW), Mengelberg is joined by the remarkably re...   [ read more ]

CD $16.13