Marilyn Crispell by Burrill Crohn
Marilyn Crispell is an improvising pianist of deep concentration and beautiful touch, who at 7:30 pm EDT tonight (Thursday, Oct 27) offers at modest cost a “private” solo concert, the webcast of a three-camera shoot, from a soundstage near her residence in Woodstock NY. This is the first I’ve heard of a jazz-related performer performing essentially via pay-per-view, but given the advances in capture and playback quality (plus having Burrill Crohn, a filmmaker who knows Crispell well, directing the video) the project makes perfect sense.
Why wouldn’t listeners around the world tune in, all together but in the privacy of our homes, an intimate visual and audio experience meant for us, as if for us alone? Crispell — a longtime member of reedist Anthony Braxton’s quartet, a denizen of Karl Berger’s Creative Music Studio and an ECM recording artist usually with her trio featuring bassist Gary Peacock and drummer Paul Motian — tours all too rarely, but always provides the kind of immersive and expressive experience associated with nuanced chamber music. Thanks to the web, she can be nearly with you.
No doubt we’ll miss the interactive element that in-the-room live performances allow, however subtly, yet Crispell is a musician who leans inward while playing, and draws folks’ ears closer to her, so good sight and sound will convey much of the feeling of being there in person. The visual element will give us one dimension more than a sound recording alone would, and the real-time aspect of the webcast adds another — anything might happen, anything. Tickets cost $9.95, and include access to on-demand video of her show for 30 days. But the thrill will be to watch her play live, knowing there’s a potentially global audience out there beyond her senses, peering over her shoulder, watching her fingers, aware as she breathes, rapt.
Have a friend over, get comfy, wine may be appropriate — at 7:30 EDT log in for an example of how you might attend more music in the 21st century. How nice to have as brilliant a pianist as Marilyn Crispell virtually in your home.