Yesterday was the Keith Jared concert in Zurich. I had gone with a friend, with whom I had gotten to know the “Köln concert” (listen) by Keith Jared.
Jared is an pianist who improvises most of his concerts. So there’s a lot of tone-finding and experimenting going on, while he’s playing. So it was unsure what to expect during the concert.
I realized, that other than with most concerts I’ve been to, you normally know one or two pieces of music atleast and can be looking forward for them to be played. Well, with improvisations that’s a different story.
The concert was in two segments of each approx. 40 minutes and each segment consisted of 4-5 individual improvisations. The concert was recored and will be made available as a CD. Of all the parts played, I personally only enjoyed 3.
Non-the-less, it was fun to see, how Jared stands up and silenty sings along as he plays. One could get the impression, in his head, he’s a a way larger concert and it’s just the piano background, that the people in the audience get to hear.
And I must point out, it’s a great thing, he doesn’t sing any louder, than he does. He might be the greatest piano player ever, but at the same time, he’s the worst singer ever.
Another strange thing was, that after leaving the stage for the 3rd or 4th time and returning for an encore, someone seemed to take a picture of him and he happened to see the red light of the camera and went off, as “this being the rudest thing in 61 years of playing the piano…” asking the person to appologize and calling him an asshole.
Well, Mr. Jared, although I have complete understanding, that you do not want your music show up on platforms like YouTube, etc. you might still want to change your approach to the problem.
You might want to come to an understanding, that people want to take home a photograph or a sound example to show their friends and tell them, how great the concert was. Not granting your paying audience this wish, is about as rude as vice-versa.
So why not take a more pragmatic approach by offering a deal to your audience à la: “Ok, I understand you want some pictures and maybe even video, sound, etc.” so here are the first three mintues of the concert, that you can film, take pictures of, share on you social networks, etc. and give them a “released to the public” concert opening. Then after 3 minutes, stopp, ask everyone to turn of their phones, cameras, etc, and shut up and enjoy the concert with no more interruptions at all. I’m sure it would be of way greater value to you, as it would virally spread your concert and be like a free preview to your CD. Think about it. Calling your audience “asshole” is not the finest thing to do.