Budapest Concert (Live)

Editors’ Notes From the same European tour that gave us Munich 2016, master pianist Keith Jarrett offers Budapest Concert, the first archival release to drop after his revelation that a series of strokes has likely ended his playing career at 75. As with all of his post-2000 improvised solo concerts, the pieces are shorter and self-contained, in contrast to the album-side-length forays of earlier decades. But the 14-minute opener is something of an exception, with a dense and dissonant contrapuntal motion that unfolds according to its own ceaseless interior logic. “Part II” and “Part III” are a stark departure, full of space and relative quiet, with lushly voiced yet unresolving harmonies. Jarrett then ventures a range of moods and settings, including the groove intensity of “Part IV,” the pastoral balladry of “Part V” and “Part XI,” the spontaneous bebop of “Part VI,” and the brief avant-garde fusillade of “Part IX,” followed by two lyrical standards as encores.