Keith Jarrett is from Allentown, PA, which for some reason doesn’t seem like the kind of place you would expect a jazz pianist to come from. The again, Ahmad Jamal was from Pittsburgh, so maybe there is something about gritty, industrial towns that make them good breeding grounds for musicians. I wonder if all the noise from the forges in those crowded mills contributes to the spaciousness and subtleness of Jamal’s and Jarrett’s compositions. That Jarrett was influenced by Jamal seems unquestionable, especially since Jarrett did a stint in Miles Davis’s group after Miles had been outspoken in his praise of Jamal.
This style caught the ear of Manfred Eicher, a German producer, who convinced Keith Jarrett to come to Europe and pursue his increasingly improvisational and spontaneous style in the company of some Continental artists. The first of many albums he recorded there was called “Belonging”, and one of the tracks, “Long as You Know You’re Living Yours” reverberated back across the ocean and caught the ear of Yacht Rock legend and Steely Dan co-founder Donald Fagan. Like a junkie with a bad desire, Fagan couldn’t let go of the melody, the rhythm, or the groove of the song.
Fagan’s bandmate, Walter Becker, was not just like a junkie, he struggled throughout the 1970’s with drug addiction, frustrating everyone around him and likely himself. There is a way in which addiction can take on a personality of its own, acting as a shadowy caricature of the person who is hooked. That shadow can show up at the most inconvenient of times, like when your bandmate is trying to negotiate a big record deal with a new company that might be distrustful of your behavior. Fagan took his frustrations with Becker into the studio, marinated them in Jarrett’s special sauce, and produced the entrancing “Gaucho“.
Last Wednesday, I stood in the checkout line at Paradise Found Records in Boulder with a reissued copy of “Gaucho” in my hand as a man who seemed too young to remember who Aretha Franklin is haggled with the owner over the price of a record. Looking at me sympathetically, the owner moved to another register to ring me up. Our young padawan noticed what I was buying and commented “That’s a good album,” as if his imprimatur should seal the deal for me.
I was too flabbergasted in the moment to respond, but on retrospect wondered if he would have had an opinion on the question of whether or not Donald Fagan had plagiarized Keith Jarrett or if the natural succession of influences had simply continued from Pittsburgh through Oslo and back to NYC. I kind of hoped that he would not recognize the name Donald Fagan, much less Keith Jarrett so that the bodacious cowboy that is my need to know more than this youngster could score a hit.
Playing around with shadowy caricatures is risky business with uncertain consequences. Although it was slow-wittedness rather than virtue that kept me from getting entangled by my ego in Paradise Found, the resulting freedom allowed me to take to the road a few days later, windows down and music up in what a dear friend described as a “summer evening adventure.” I put on my “Friend of the World” mix, inspired by the good vibes of Zen Sutherland.
As I came to a stop light, “Long as You Know Your Living Yours” came on. I turned it up, not knowing that I was being observed by a deputy of the Larimer County Sherriff. Then I heard a voice crying out “Hey!” and again, “Hey!” I swiveled around to see the law looking at me. “What are you listening to?” he asked. “Keith Jarrett,” I said. “Do you know the Steely Dan album ‘Gaucho’?” I queried. “Yeah!” he said. “This is where they got it from,” I told him. “Cool!” he said. And then we both drove off into the night.