Ron Carter Esperanza Spalding - Downbeat

DIANA KRALL
So when Krall entered New York’s Avatar Studios with Burnett and
her collaborators to construct her new album, it’s no surprise that her
father’s gramophone played a role, albeit virtually. “We sat around and
listened to the original versions of the songs—and then we just played,”
says Krall. “We went through 35 tunes that I’d chosen, including some
that I’d recorded on my iPhone off of the gramophone horn, since that
was the only place I could get them.”
Both Krall and Burnett describe the atmosphere of the sessions as
one particularly conducive to experimentation, rather than clinical execution.
“The studio was dark and set up with couches and chairs, so it
didn’t really feel like a studio,” says Burnett. “It was like a killer latenight
jam session, just not at a brothel,” he continues, laughing. “We had
tape running whenever musicians were in the studio. Remember [the
documentary film] Straight, No Chaser, where Monk and the trio were
playing an incredible tune, and they get through it, and the producer
walks through the door and says, ‘OK, you ready to do one?’ And Monk
says, ‘Man, we just did one!’ That’s what we wanted never to happen.”
“We worked late, hung out and talked, and played music,” Krall
says. “It was a creative, joyful, hilarious place to work. The studio was a
comfortable place to hang, and afterwards, I just didn’t want it to end.”
That comfortable vibe was key in shaping the arrangements and overall
flavor of the album. “Even though I had chosen the 35 tunes that we
were going to draw from, we didn’t know how were going to do them,”
she says. “There were no lead sheets. T Bone and I had a pre-production
meeting, and we gave each of the guys CDs of the tunes to listen to, but
we were working with players who approach things differently than a lot
of jazz musicians, who use the II-V-I and I-VI-II-V language.”
The group sat together, hammered out loose chord sheets, and reconciled
what each of them was hearing, and wanted to hear, in each
song. “That’s one reason why I think it was so great,” Krall describes.
“There wasn’t a detailed chart in front of everybody saying, ‘You play
this here,’ but it wasn’t completely improvised, either. We had structure,
but not a lot of specific direction.” The open vibe of the sessions also
led to playful collaboration beyond the core band, with both Burnett
and Costello contributing spontaneous elements to the album. “I don’t
think you can hear me playing much,” admits Burnett. “I was just playing
‘trance’ music in the middle of it. I treat all instruments as drums
and resonating chambers that you strike with something like a bow or
your hand. So lately, I’ve just been looking for the core of the song, and
I try to identify it and play that in the simplest way I can with the most
abstract sound I can find. That’s what I did here.”
“It was tremendous fun,” Krall summarizes. “Like getting everybody
paintbrushes and seeing what we all could do following different
ideas.”
Pianos, Strings and a Shotgun
The first time I saw Krall live was in San Francisco’s Davies
Symphony Hall, with an orchestra behind her and a Steinway grand in
front of her. Looking perfectly at home flanked by such sonic power,
Krall became a quintessential “grand piano performer” in my mind—
hence my surprise to find out that the majority of piano parts on the new
album came courtesy not of a 9-foot juggernaut, but rather an 1890s
Steinway upright. The sound, equal parts dance hall, honky-tonk, grandmother’s
parlor and ballet rehearsal studio, melds perfectly with the
place-out-of-time feel of the album.
“I grew up playing upright and didn’t even touch a grand piano until
later on in life,” says Krall. “It was always sort of an intimidating thing,
coming from being a little kid playing on my nana’s spinet piano. Even
today, I don’t bring huge pianos on the road with me. Mostly 7-foot
Steinway grands.”
Krall knew from the beginning that she needed something different
for Glad Rag Doll. A particularly soulful piano she found at a friend’s
house proved not to be a feasible option, and she went so far as to have
a 9-foot Steinway grand that formerly was used at New York’s Avery
Fisher Hall sent to the studio. But it was a casual conversation with Green
32 DOWNBEAT DECEMBER 2012