Early Morning Blues - The Rein de Graaff Trio

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.  

Since its inception 11 years ago, writing this blog has brought me into contact with many new Jazz friends and musicians, among whom are three exceptional players from Holland: pianist, Rein de Graaff, bassist Marius Beets and drummer Eric Ineke.

Most of our contact has been via the internet and through phone conversations, but thanks to their attendance at a Los Angeles-based Jazz event a few years ago, I was also fortunate enough to be able to share a breakfast with Rein and Eric at our home.

Rein, Marius and Eric are a hard driving straight-ahead rhythm section that forms a perfect complement to Jazz played in this style, one which is near and dear to my heart.

They usually record as a unit in support of horn players, so when I received the news that the trio was planning a rare excursion into a CD using just a piano, bass and drums format, I asked if I could prepare the insert notes. The response to this request is what follows.

“Imagine, if you will, being a young Jazz musician living in Holland, where your primary exposure to the post World War II Bebop Jazz scene in America is via recordings or the occasional concert or local club appearance by one of the Jazz musicians you’ve long admired. You dream that one day you’ll get to work with these American Jazz musicians who have become your idols.

Over the decade or so since you first fell in love with the music as a teenager, your skills as a player have evolved to the point where you can more than hold your own with other Jazz musicians with whom you perform in The Netherlands.

There’s enough work in the Jazz clubs in Den Haag or in Amsterdam or in Rotterdam, so you get to play Jazz on a regular basis, although more than likely, as is the case with many Jazz musicians who haven’t achieved international acclaim, you probably hold down a day gig to pay the rent and take care of your family.

Maybe if you are a pianist or a bassist or a drummer, you come together often enough to form a tight knit rhythm section and to work fairly regularly as a piano-bass-drums trio.

As you come into your own as a rhythm unit, you begin to notice that you are getting regular calls by promoters or nightclub owners to work with American Jazz musicians who are touring Europe.

With the passage of time, you also notice another trend as a result of a dynamic that the Jazz musician and writer Mike Zwerin described as a time when “Jazz went to Europe to live.”

Pushed out by the burgeoning Rock ‘n Roll and Folk Music phenomenons that swept the youth in the USA of the 1960s,  American Jazz musicians were becoming expatriates and settling in Europe where the music still had a fan base.

So now instead of the occasional gig with the likes of tenor saxophonist Don Byas who settled in France or trumpeter Benny Bailey who settled in Sweden or tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon who settled in Denmark, you become part of their touring band whenever they make it to Holland.

One day you're listening to them on records and the next you’re making a gig with them at Nick’s Cafe in Laren, The Netherlands!

Over the last century or so, this dream-like existence became a reality for pianist Rein de Graaff and his close associate, drummer Eric Ineke, as they along with a small number of excellent Dutch bassists, the most recent of whom is Marius Beets, have been the rhythm section of choice for a whole host of visiting American Jazz musicians.

All one need do is look at Rein’s discography in Wikipedia or Discogs dating back to 1969 to find their names which would include: J.R. Monterose, Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin, Teddy Edwards, Al Cohn, Dave Pike, Charles McPherson, David “Fathead” Newman, Marcel Ivery, Major Holley, Conte Candoli, Bob Cooper, Bud Shank, Nick Brignola, Ronnie Cuber, Herb Geller, Pete Christlieb, Sam Most, and Scott Hamilton, not to mention a slew of notable Dutch Jazz musicians.

Many of these recordings by these prominent American Jazzmen accompanied by Rein’s trio followed tours of Holland and the neighboring Low Countries.

Incidentally, Wim Wigt, the producer of this disc for his Timeless label was the manager of these gigs in the Netherlands and he was able to find bookings in Hilversum, Leiden, Veendam, Venlo, Zwolle, Den Haag, Heemskerk, Amsterdam, De Woude, Rotterdam, and Enschede. As Dexter Gordon would tell his friends :” … there were jazz lovers in all these places in a country the size of the state of Maryland.”

We spoke to Rein de Graaff by phone recently to get his take on how Early Morning Blues came about and to discuss the music he selected for the recording.

In terms of how the disc evolved, Rein explained that: “We are so busy working behind horn players that we only get a chance to perform as a trio a couple of times a year.”

So I decided to get together with Eric and Marius and make this trio album. When it was finished I suddenly realized that the last time I made a trio recording was in 1981 - almost forty years ago!”

Rein was referring to Chasin the Bird issued in 1981 as a Timeless LP [SJP 159] on which he is joined by bassist Koos Serierse and drummer Eric Ineke.

On Early Morning Blues, Eric continues as Rein’s drummer of choice, a role he has assumed for over four decades, with Marius Beets stepping in to handle the bass lines as well as to take responsibility for recording, editing and mastering the the album.

When I asked Rein if there was a theme around which the 13 tracks of the recording was based he replied: “No, no theme, but my music comes from Bebop and its legends such as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Bud Powell, so there is usually a close relationship with that style of Jazz for many of the tunes that I selected.

For example, Don’t Blame Me and Lover Man are two ballads that are closely associated with Charlie Parker while These Are The Things and Moonology are based on a standard set of chord progressions that all beboppers liked to play on.”

“I chose to play these tunes as duos with Marius because I was visiting his studio to checkout the piano the day before we recorded there as a trio. Marius had the tape running and we sounded so good on the two tunes that we decided to include them on the finished recording.

You know, the piano is different in every studio, so that’s how the solo piano version of Little Girl Blue came about; with me testing the instrument.”

When I asked him about Avalon, a Swing Era tune not often heard in modern Jazz setting,  Rein explained that “ I have never played it before. A few days earlier, I was listening to a performance of the tune on pianist Elmo Hope’s LP that features tenor saxophonists Hank Mobley and John Coltrane with Donald Byrd on trumpet and I guess the tune was still in my mind when I called it at a tempo we used to play it at with Johnny Griffin. For something we never played before, we were all pleased with the way it turned out.”

In commenting about Early Morning Blues, Rein said: “The challenge of this piece is not just to play a slow blues, but to play it with a Blues feeling. Too often these days, you hear one without the other. I wanted the trio to play The Blues and I liked each version so much that we kept them both.”

Regarding other tunes on the recording, Rein shared that “Godchild, Fly Me to the Moon and Dear Old Stockholm are tunes that I like to play at home but which I haven’t played in public before. So when I brought them to the trio, I thought of how they could be arranged. For example, Dear Old Stockholm brought to mind the classic Miles Davis Quintet arrangement, which drummer Art Taylor taught me, while the ending for Fly Me to the Moon gave us an opportunity to add a “turnaround” to extend the swing of the piece, a device I learned from Sonny Stitt. Godchild by pianist George Wallington is straight out of Bud Powell, who all bebop pianists come from, so in a way this becomes the trio’s homage to him. The relaxed tempo also provides a nice vehicle to highlight Marius’ solo skills”

Although, it’s not a Blues, the trio’s rendering of If I Had You takes on the slow blues inflection that’s reflected in the title tune while the closer Wahoo, Charlie Parker’s version of the Jazz standard, Perdido, shows off the trio’s ability to dig into a hard driving and very funky groove.”

Rein’s colleagues on this recording, drummer Eric Ineke and bassist Marius Beets, have each had distinguished careers in their own right.

Universally acclaimed as one of the great Jazz drummers of the modern era, Eric Ineke currently leads the Jazzxpress, a dynamic quintet with six CDs to its credit. Eric is in demand throughout the Europe as a performer and a teacher and he holds a faculty position at the Royal Conservatoire in Den Haag, The Netherlands.

Marius Beets performs with Eric in the Jazzxpress and with his brothers, Alexander [tenor sax] and Peter [piano] in a big band and small group that the brothers co-lead. In addition to his musical gifts as a bassist and composer, Marius maintains his own recording studio and is an accomplished recording engineer.

Not all of us get to live out our musical dreams, but Rein de Graaff followed his dreams into an existential reality that would be the envy of most Jazz musicians and he did so while maintaining the highest standards for performance in perpetuating the Bebop Jazz style.

After listening to the music on Early Morning Blues, I’m sure that you’ll agree with me that the trio is the perfect setting to demonstrate Rein’s skills as a master Jazz pianist in the Bebop tradition.

If as Louis Armstrong once said: “Jazz is who you are,” then this recording reveals the definitive Rein de Graaff.”

- Steven A. Cerra

Early Morning Blues [Timeless CDSJP 487]  is a brilliantly conceived and executed excursion into piano trio Jazz and you can add it to your collection.

Although the CD will not be available for purchase until March 15, 2019 at the Timeless Records website, I am posting this review now in conjunction with the latter part of Rein de Graaff’s Farewell Tour which you can checkout below. His regular trio of Marius Beets and Eric Ineke will be augmented with saxophonists Benjamin Herman, Maarten Hoogenhuis, Marco Kegel and Tineke Postma. Special guest: baritone saxophonist Ronnie Cuber.

Fri March 1: De Tor, Enschede

Sat March 2: Mahogany Hall, Edam

Sun March 3: Tivoli/Vredenburg, Utrecht 16:00 (feat. Ronnie Cuber)

Wed March 6: Brouwerij Martinus, Groningen

Fri March 8: De Harmonie, Leeuwarden

Sat March 10:Theater van Beresteyn, Veendam 15:00

Fri March 15:Bimhuis, Amsterdam (feat. Ronnie Cuber)

Al Cohn

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

Sometimes it’s funny how I arrive at the subjects and themes for the postings that appear on the blog.

I like to think that I am a fairly well-organized person, or at least organized enough to write the name of a Jazz musician down in my list of blog projects notebook so as to have a reminder in place about a future posting.

Such was the case with one “Al Cohn.”

Checking back in this notebook you’d see his musician’s name appear in the sax section of the Four Brothers Band of Woody Herman, as the source of arrangements written for the big bands led by Terry Gibbs, Maynard Ferguson and Gerry Mulligan, a quintet that he co-led with Zoot Sims, and the leader of a marvelous set of small group recordings done for the Concord label in the early 1980s.

I mean given the magnitude of his accomplishments in the world of modern Jazz from the mid-1940s until his death in 1988, how could anyone forget the name - “Al Cohn” - as the subject of a feature in a blog that purports itself to be about “Focused Profiles on Jazz and Its Creators!?”

But somehow, ‘lo these many years, I did.

And you’ll never guess what finally got me to this feature on Al. Give up? It was a 1987 recording, remastered and reissued on CD in 2010 as Al Cohn: Rifftide [Timeless Jazz Legacy Remastered TJL 74505] on which Al appears with pianist Rein de Graaff, bassist Koos Serierse and drummer Eric Ineke.

That’s ironic right? 1987, the year before his death??

Sigh, best laid plans and all that …. But I guess it takes what it takes so whatever the source for the spark of enlightenment, here’s some long overdue thought about Al Cohn and his music.

Cohn was the consummate jazz professional. His arrangements were foursquare and unpretentious and his saxophone-playing a model of order and accuracy. He was perhaps never more completely himself than as one of the Four Brothers, the legendary Woody Herman saxophone section. Later in life, though, his soloing look on a philosophical authority unexciting but deeply satisfying.

As Don Heckman explains in his essay The Saxophone in Jazz which can be found in Bill Kirchner, ed., The Oxford Companion to Jazz:

“The real force of Young's influence first came to the attention of the wider jazz audience with the Woody Herman Four Brothers Band of the late forties. Stan Getz's Young-inspired solo on "Early Autumn" touched listeners outside the jazz arena. And the other tenors in the band — Zoot Sims, Al Cohn, Jimmy Giuffre, Herbie Steward (and, later, Ammons) — emulated Young with the same intensity with which other saxophonists were examining Parker.

Equally significant, Giuffre's "Four Brothers" and Ralph Burns's "Early Autumn" brought a new saxophone section sound—one based upon the combination of three tenor saxophones and one baritone saxophone. It was a combination that never would have worked with players possessing the big, wide-vibrato sound of Hawkins. But with each of the Herman saxophonists using cool-toned, relatively vibra-toless Young timbres, the smooth, grainy sound that emerged was so effective that it ruled the Herman book for years to come. Less obviously, it colored saxophone section playing in general, with a Four Brothers—like sound turning up in other band s— Stan Kenton, Buddy Rich, Maynard Ferguson — in which lead alto players in traditional two-alto, two-tenor, and baritone sections adopted a comparably coo land tenor-like tone. (The Basie and Ellington orchestras, their identities already well established, stuck with the more sumptuous textures of the prewar, Hodges-led section style.)”

In his insert notes to Al Cohn on the Saxophone [Dawn DCD 102], Gary Kramer observed of Al:

“AL COHN IS ONE OF THE HARDEST WORKING AND MOST sought-after musicians in Local 802. This isn't just because he is an extremely competent technician and knowing stylist, but because, in addition, he is an "ideas man." Many veins of modern jazz have been so thoroughly worked over that there gets to be a premium on miners like Cohn that can be relied upon to bring up a handful of bright new nuggets every trip down.

With all the bread-and-butter jobs available to jazzmen today, some cynics are saying (with a grain of reason), "More musicians than ever are eating now, and fewer than ever of them are thinking." That Cohn can't be included among the latter is all the more remarkable for the fact that he gets so few breathing spells between jobs. The originality and solidity of his work can easily be documented from his prolific record output. Cohn's undeniable progress is not so much a matter of "advancing" but one of broadening and deepening.

The most impressive thing about Cohn is his sense of heritage, his awareness of what elements of traditional jazz are worth preserving and synthesizing with the modern idiom. His fundamental beat, his dynamic tone and his extrovert spirit arc reincarnations in modern dress of some of the permanently useful ingredients of the older jazz. Observing the frantic efforts of some musicians these days to be "modern" at any cost, Cohn remarked, "Sometimes I feel I don't belong in the modern school at all. Lots of people try to be modern and lose sight of the path." Cohn has a conscious pride in being in the "mainstream" and is not ashamed of his debt to Armstrong, Young, Hawkins and the other giants who antedate Charlie Parker.

Cohn, even though he records frequently with modernists of the more "advanced" sort, admits that when he is at home, he prefers usually to play records for his own pleasure that go back 10 years or more. "They had a happier, more relaxed sound. In general, the solos were much more memorable and 1 think that that is a necessary mark of great ]azz." Cohn is a product of the Swing Era and its big bands, and without feeling that he is a reactionary, goes back to that music for enjoyment and inspiration. It is not a matter of copying anything done in the early Forties, but of being re-infected by the spirit of a less inhibited musical atmosphere.

Al was born and brought up in Brooklyn. As a youngster, he had eyes only for the piano and the clarinet. Lester Young was the great influence of his teenage years, he recalls, and was his inspiration to take up the tenor saxophone. He learned to play tenor by himself, and even though he never took a lesson on the instrument, at 18 he landed a job with Joe Marsala's big band [1943]. Then for several years, until the end of 1946, Cohn played with Georgie Auld off and on and Boyd Raeburn [1946]. Stints in the Alvino Rev, Buddy Rich, Woody Herman [1947-49], Artie Shaw [1949] and Elliot Lawrence bands [on and off from 1952-58] followed.”

Leroy Ostransky in The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz picks up the story of Al’s career

“During the 1950’s Al often worked as a freelance arranger, writing straightforward arrangements in the manner of Neal Hefti: his version of Stardust is a good example of his work in this field.

From 1957 into the early 1980s Cohn led a quintet with Zoot Sims, also a former sideman of Herman's. The two players formed an interesting combination: they were both influenced by Lester Young, but Cohn's tone was slightly warmer than his partner's.  After successful stints in NYC, notably at the Half Note in the 1950s and 60s, they reformed their quintet and toured Scandinavia in 1974 and Japan in 1978.

Cohn was principal arranger for the musicals Raisin (1973), Music, Music, Music (1974), and Sophisticated Ladies (1981), and he played solos on the soundtrack to the film Lenny (1974). In the 1980s he continued to perform in clubs in New York and appear at European festivals.”

Other than his tenure in the Woody Herman Four Brothers Band, perhaps Al’s most famous association was in the quintet he co-led with tenor saxophonist Zoot Sims. The esteemed Jazz author and critic Ira Gitler details the evolution and continuance of the Al-Zoot collaboration in his insert notes to Al Cohn- Zoot Sims: From A to Z:

“Earlier in the 1940s, in New York, they had been briefly introduced when one was entering and the other leaving Charlie's Tavern, famed watering hole for musicians on 7th Avenue, but the official meeting of Al Cohn and Zoot Sims took place in a Salt Lake City parking tot when Al joined Woody Herman's band in January of 1948. It was the beginning of one of jazz's most beautiful and productive friendships.

Bom three and a half weeks and three thousand miles apart in the fall of 1925 — Al in Brooklyn and Zoot in Inglewood, California — each began musical studies on the clarinet but eventually gravitated to the tenor saxophone as his main instrument.

After serving as sidemen in various big bands, Cohn and Sims became linked fraternally in the 1947-49 edition of Herman's Herd called the 'Four Brothers" band. It derived its title from the composition of the same name by Jimmy Giuffre who had played with Sims, Herbie Steward and Stan Getz in Gene Roland's band at Pontrelli's Ballroom in East Los Angeles. The three-tenor-and-baritone-saxophone sound was carried into Herman's band when he reformed in California in the fall of 1947. Sims was not widely known as a soloist, but this was soon remedied when he was featured with Woody.

Cohn had been capturing the ears of the New York cognoscenti that summer in Buddy Rich's band. When he replaced Steward in Herman's orchestra, the "Four Brothers" sound became really established, as Herbie had been mainly playing alto, picking up the tenor only on "Four Brothers" and 'Early Autumn."

Although Herman used Conn's charts (“The Goof and I" and, later, "Music To Dance To") he didn't let him solo beyond the Guiffre number. Getz and Sims had a monopoly on the tenor solos, but if Woody didn't fully appreciate Al's playing at the time, the rest of the band did. Zoot and Al formed a mutual admiration society on and off the stand.

Both men left Herman at different time in 1949, Al returning to his native New York and Zoot putting down new roots there. They played together briefly in Artie Shaw's orchestra and did a lot of jamming in small Manhattan studios that they and other musicians could rent cheaply. There was the historic five-tenor date for Prestige in April 1949 with Cohn, Sims, Getz, Alien Eager and Brew Moore; and a three-tenor group with Al, Zoot and Stan that gigged one night on Long Island and recorded a May '49 session for Savoy.

In September 1952 Al and Zoot recorded for Prestige with trombonist Kai Winding in the front line. The sound of the two tenors, particularly on "Zootcase,” where Kai dropped out, was the first recording that predicted the group they would co-lead later on in the decade.

After playing with Elliot Lawrence's orchestra in 1952, Conn became very active as a writer for radio and TV. At the same time Sims, who had toured Europe with Goodman in '50 and Kenlon in '53, went back to California, returning to New York in 1955 as part of the Gerry Mulligan sextet.

In October 1954 Cohn began recording for RCA with Jack Lewis as his A and R man. The Natural Seven date was done in February of 1955 and Freddie Green's Mr Rhythm in December. In that same December Al and Zoot were booked into Birdland and Jack Lewis decided to record them on January 24,1956. The gig and the record stimulated Sims and Cohn to take a group on the road for the first time. "We had two cars," says Al. "He took the bass and drums—Knobby Totah and Ray Mosca—and Dave McKenna rode with me."

This was a short-lived effort and the two did not try a group again until 1957 when they did a second album, this time for Coral in March. Their quintet really didn't leap ahead until 1959. They appeared at the Randall's Island Jazz Festival and began a long association with the now legendary Half Note club. In the '60s they played there several times a year, once doing a five-week engagement. A Sims-Cohn booking over the New Year's holiday became a tradition. I spent many a happy New Year's Eve down at Hudson and Spring. In fact, in those days I never thought of being anywhere else as December 31st came to a close.

On the elevated bandstand their great rapport and mutual respect were there for all to see and hear. If one was "hotter" at a particular time, the other would play a shorter solo than usual in deference to his partner. For the most part, however, each man's solo inspired the other's; and the eight- and four-bar exchanges would roil and broil to peaks of excitement.

In the 70s Cohn and Sims did not team as often as they had in the '60s. Al stayed extremely busy as a writer for TV and Broadway. Each traveled on his own, picking up local rhythm sections, but they did tour Scandinavia in 1974, and there were a couple of Sunday nights at Eddie Condon's, where they had people lined up on West 54th Street, waiting to get in. Shades of the old Half Note.

In the '80s both men continued to play clubs and record as separate entities. One place where they were able to hang out and play together was at Dick and Maddie Gibson's Colorado Jazz Party. I'll never forget a set at the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs when the two tenors backed Sarah Vaughan. It was black tie night and everyone was looking and feeling elegant. Sassy, Zoot and Al translated the sublimity of the evening into musical terms. I wish I had a video.

When Zoot died in March 1985, so did one of the special partnerships in jazz, even if by then it was a sometime thing. It didn't matter how seldom they played as a team in the '80s; the Conn-Sims entry had long since been immortalized.”

To my ears, Al Cohn had a broad, heavy tone; he played in an uncomplicated style, employing regular phrase lengths and idiomatic bop figures. At times, you could hear the earlier influences of Ben Webster and Coleman Hawkins creeping back into his “roughened” sonority.

Cohn wasn't always the most convincing soloist, leaving his own most compelling ideas rather hanging in the air. But this tendency to incompletion may have been due to the fact that Al heard more ideas than most and, as a result, was confronted by too many choices. Maybe this is what Ira was alluding to when he described “... Al’s strongly, sagacious, swinging style.”

Alone Together with Rein de Graaff and The Metropole Orchestra

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“Rein de Graaff is a man of contrasts. He is one of Europe's foremost jazz musicians, but he describes himself as "a jazz fan who happens to play the piano." He turned down many offers to go on tour with American stars like Sonny Stitt and Archie Shepp because he has not much time to travel; he is a businessman on weekdays who gigs only in the weekends.

He will explain to you at length that he considers himself a jazz musician rather than a pianist: "I don't play the piano like a pianist does. I comp like a drummer and play single-note lines like a horn player." However, he has recorded some of the most fluent, swinging and beautiful piano solos I've ever heard in the Low Countries.”

- Jeroen de Valk, Jazz author and critic

Although, the general focus of most of the postings to JazzProfiles is about Jazz musicians and Jazz styles, there are occasions in which we like to spend time with Jazz interpretations of our favorite tunes.

Or to put it another way, no tunes, no Jazz for as the late bassist Charles Mingus stated: “You’ve got to improvise on something.”

As Charles implies it’s all intertwined as one thing leads to another and I generally find myself recounting who the Jazz musician or Jazz group is that’s performed one of my favorite tunes.

Or to rework the tile of this piece a little, Alone But Together; you really can’t separate the Jazz musician from his/her music.

Which brings me to a tune that has always fascinated me - Alone Together.

These excerpts from Ted Gioia’s continually fascinating The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire go a long way toward explaining why.

“Alone Together - Composed by Arthur Schwartz, with lyrics by Howard Dietz

“At 14, Arthur Schwartz played piano accompaniment to silent films in his native Brooklyn, and from an early age he showed a knack for writing his own songs. At his father's urging, though, Schwartz put music on the back burner and pursued a career in law. With degrees from NYU and Columbia in hand, he was admitted to the New York bar in 1924, and practiced law for four years before turning his back on the legal profession to work full-time as a songwriter. Around that same time Schwartz met up with lyricist Howard Dietz, another Columbia University alum (where Dietz had been a classmate of Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein), and the following year they launched their first Broadway production, the successful revue The Little Show. ...

Alone Together made its debut in the 1932 show Flying Colors, which closed as a financial failure after 188 performances, ...The song fared better than the show, however, and Leo Reisman enjoyed a top 10 hit with his recording that same year.

"Alone Together" has an unusual form, with a 14-bar A theme that resolves surprisingly in the tonic major, but in the last restatement is truncated to 12 bars that conclude in the minor. The form can confuse the uninitiated, and don't be surprised if you hear the pianist at the cocktail bar try to squeeze "Alone Together" into a standard 32-bar AABA form. Yet I suspect that the very peculiarities in the composition, especially the major-minor ambiguity, account for much of the appeal to improvisers.

Artie Shaw played the key role in establishing "Alone Together" as a jazz standard, recording it with his band in 1939,  … When Dizzy Gillespie recorded "Alone Together" in 1950, he followed the Shaw playbook with a somber rendition over string accompaniment. Miles Davis adopted a far more modernistic approach in his 1955 recording, with the countermelodies and shifting rhythms bearing more the stamp of Charles Mingus (who was bassist on this date) than the trumpeter.

The personality of this song would change gradually over the years, as it lost its exotic, mood music origins and emerged as a dark, minor-key song in a straight swing rhythm. In the right arrangement, "Alone Together" can sound like a hard bop chart written for a Blue Note session. In fact, given the dark, brooding quality of the tune, I'm surprised it didn't show up on more Blue Note dates, but when it did (as on Stanley Turrentine's 1966 session with McCoy Tyner for the Easy Walker date), it fit perfectly with the grit and groove of the proceedings. Sonny Rollins takes a similar tack on his 1958 performance for the Contemporary label [Sonny Rollins and the Contemporary Leaders].

The composition is still typically performed at a medium tempo, not much different from what Leo Reisman offered back in 1932 — although usually more medium-fast than medium-slow nowadays. But fast, aggressive versions are increasingly common —.”

The version of Alone Together that prompted the development of this feature is the one that Dutch Jazz pianist Rein de Graaff recorded on October 3, 1992 in Hilversum, The Netherlands with The Metropole Orchestra conducted by the renown Rob Pronk.

You can located in it on the Timeless CD Nostalgia [SJP 429] which is a compilation CD made up of five tracks with Rein performing with the Metropole in 1992, two tracks of Rein performing with Barry Harris in Groningen, Holland in 1991 with a rhythm section of Koos Serierse on bass and Eric Ineke on drums and four tracks recorded in 1994 in Monster Holland, with alto saxophonists Gary Foster and Marco Kegel and Rein, Koos and Eric.

Thanks to some visits together during his recent trips to the United States, I’ve had the opportunity to get to know Rein somewhat. In conversation - by the way, his English is better than mine, - he is soft-spoken, extremely polite and mild-mannered. He loves “a piece of bread” with all manner of food and in a conversation over a meal he is relaxed, unassuming and an attentive listener; although I suspect that on the subject of most things to do with bebop, he could finish my sentences for me, but demurrers [did I mention that he was polite?].

But all of that vanishes when he sits down at a piano keyboard and becomes a take-no-prisoners, monster improviser who is capable of unfurling line after line of dotted eighth note, syncopated melodies that are loaded with bebop licks that you’ve heard before, but never quite combined in this manner. He becomes an original by the way in which he weaves together the unoriginal as he tries to get as close as possible to the nirvana of interlacing chorus after chorus of uninterrupted improvisations [what Jazz musicians referred to as “lines”]. Sometimes, ideas seem to come to him so fast and furious that he can barely put them together before moving on to the next set of musical thoughts or suggestions. It’s like he’s managed to memorize every piece of bebop ever played in the past, deconstruct them and put them together in a new and different way - instantaneously.

And he doesn’t rush - he pushes the time because he plays ahead of the beat - but he doesn’t rush.

In listening to a lot of Rein’s recordings lately [he’s sending me more!!] - I always suspected that one of the keys to his success as an improvisor was his ability to chose the right tempo to play the tunes he favors.

And what do you know, he confirmed this in a recent conversation about his playing on the tune Flamingo on a CD that he along with Marius Beets [pronounced Bates in English] on bass and Eric Ineke on drums made with tenor saxophonist Scott Hamilton. [You can find this track in a video montage at the end of this piece.]

I was sharing with him how the sequence of choruses he plays on this eleven [11] minute track had literally reduced me to giggles they were so good when he blurted out - “It’s the tempo!”

Bingo! - the implication being that the tempo was just right in leaving him time to think and connect one well-constructed, improvised line [melody] with the next.

Of course, notwithstanding his incredible talent, I imagine it helps to have been doing this for 50 years!!

Jeroen de Valk who recently published a revised and expanded biography of trumpeter Chet Baker wrote these insert notes for the Nostalgia  CD.

“Rein de Graaff is a man of contrasts. He is one of Europe's foremost jazz musicians, but he describes himself as "a jazz fan who happens to play the piano." He turned down many offers to go on tour with American stars like Sonny Stitt and Archie Shepp because he has not much time to travel; he is a businessman on weekdays who gigs only in the weekends.

He will explain to you at length that he considers himself a jazz musician rather than a pianist: "I don't play the piano like a pianist does. I comp like a drummer and play single-note lines like a horn player." However, he has recorded some of the most fluent, swinging and beautiful piano solos I've ever heard in the Low Countries.

The most astonishing aspect of Rein's artistry is his understanding of the bebop language. He is almost entirely self-taught as a pianist and has been living most of his life in a small town in the north of the Netherlands. But when he visited New York for the first time as a young man, he felt at home right away. At a jam session in Harlem, a big fat mamma from this black neighbourhood hugged him warmly, with tears in her eyes. "You sound like a black man!", she shouted. This was obviously the highest praise that could possibly be bestowed on Rein.

Although it may sound weird, it is perhaps his jazz fan status that makes him sound so consistently inspired and professional. He makes music because he loves to do it and for no other reason. Music is for him, to quote Zoot Sims, "serious fun". He always plays with at least a hundred per cent dedication.

On this record, you hear what Rein does: playing bebop piano. While listening to the duo-tracks with Rein's favourite pianist, bebop master Barry Harris, you will notice how much they sound alike. Their solos are characterized by clarity; each phrase is a small melody with a beginning, a middle and an end.

Rein plays the first seven choruses in Au Privave, Barry the next five. Then they alternate eight choruses, followed by 'fours' until the last theme. In the next tune, you hear

Rein plays Nostalgia and Barry Casbah, two tunes based on the chords of Out of Nowhere. Barry plays two choruses, Rein the next two. Then they take half a chorus each, they alternate 'eights' for one chorus, followed by a chorus of 'fours'.

Another passion of Rein's is the musical world of Lennie Tristano, the legendary pianist, composer and guru of the cool school who died in 1978 at the age of 59. In four tracks, he plays with two alto saxophonists who know a thing or two about Tristano's concept: Gary Foster from LA (right channel) and Marco Kegel, a 22-year-old from Holland. Their collective improvisations will remind you of Warne Marsh and Lee Konitz, Tristano's great saxophone team.

As usual, the themes are complicated lines, based on standards. Tristano used to say: "That's our link to the people." Ablution is All the Things You Are. Lennie's Pennies is Pennies from Heaven (in a minor key, for a change), Dreamstepper is You Stepped out of a Dream and Subconscious-Lee is What Is this Thing Called Love. The rhythm section is once again Koos Serierse (bass) and Eric Ineke (drums). They have been working with Rein for almost twenty years.

In the first five tracks. Rein is featured soloist with the Metropole Orchestra. The arrangements, written by Dolf de Vries (Alone Together),  Rob Pronk (How High the Moon, I Cover the Waterfront), Henk Meutgeert (Afternoon in Paris} and Lex Jasper (Cherokee), are just right for this combination: relaxed and inspiring. They give the rhythm section room to swing, allow the horns and strings to phrase as one man, and Rein to improvise freely at great length.

Rein sounds as if he has been working with these experienced studio musicians for a hundred years. Listen to him playing bebop piano. He is brilliant.”

• Jeroen de Valk