{"id":10444,"date":"2021-02-12T10:39:45","date_gmt":"2021-02-12T10:39:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/?p=10444"},"modified":"2021-02-12T22:43:04","modified_gmt":"2021-02-12T22:43:04","slug":"captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/2021\/02\/12\/captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea\/","title":{"rendered":"Captain Marvel: RIP Chick Corea"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The world of music is mourning the loss of Chick Corea, legendary jazz pianist and composer, who died on 9th February at the age of 79.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_10445\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10445\" style=\"width: 470px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-image-10445\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/files\/2021\/02\/chick_corea.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"470\" height=\"273\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-10445\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Image via Jazziz<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>A colossus of the jazz piano stage, his endless creativity can be heard fizzing across the decades, whether as part of the broiling textures of <em>Bitches Brew<\/em> or <em>Black Beauty<\/em> behind Miles Davis, or the white-hot cultural meldings of <em>Return to Forever<\/em>\u2019s fusion; the sinuous partnership duetting with Gary Burton; his Elektric Band and its kinder counterpart, the Akoustic Trio; or the stand-alone intimacy of <em>Children\u2019s Songs<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>My ears were first opened to his music after a crate-digging spree with my father in a junk shop in West Worthing when I was around nine or ten; a jazz fan with a burgeoning record-collection, he emerged from the dusty recesses of the shop clutching a brace of cassettes \u2013 <em>Secret Agent<\/em> and the <em>Return to Forever<\/em> album, the latter adorned with a swirlingly psychedelic cover, the former sporting a young dude in a trilby. The neat, deft, and dazzling intricacy of &#8216;Fickle Funk&#8217; (featuring Allen Vizzutti) was all it took, and from then on his music became a firm fixture in my listening. OK, the Elektric Band felt a little lacking in warmth, perhaps because Dave Weckl\u2019s drumming was technically brilliant but lacking the loose-limbed fluidity of Jack DeJohnette or the neat trim of Ed Thigpen, or the generosity of Grady Tate \u2013 but I loved the tapestry of textures.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kent-video-wrapper\"><span class='embed-youtube' style='text-align:center; display: block;'><iframe class='youtube-player' type='text\/html' width='474' height='297' src='https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/FCuMz9qIGAo?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;fs=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;wmode=transparent' frameborder='0' allowfullscreen='true'><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p>I saw him live in a solo piano tour at Leeds Town Hall in 1992, in my first year at university, travelling across to Leeds from York. And I witnessed a remarkable moment. During the concert, Chick announced he was going to play music by someone he truly admired, and opened a copy of Bach\u2019s <em>48 Preludes and Fugues<\/em>, and started to play. And every pianist\u2019s nightmare happened \u2013 it must have been a new-ish score, as the pages slowly closed in front of him as he played. Turning to the audience (still playing), he gave a shrug as if to say \u2018What can you do ?\u2019 and carried on playing, and slowly moved out of Bach into an improvisation, opening out with a wondrous organic sense from Bach\u2019s language and into his own, improvised extension-cum-response. It was amazing, and rightly received huge applause.<\/p>\n<p>For me, nothing quite beats the gentle melancholy of &#8216;Crystal Silence,&#8217; particularly in <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/track\/1Hq8J28icckPCfVBH1kSJD?si=08WxXyU9Tqq3p5RNZ6lHcw\">this wonderfully hushed duet with Gary Burton.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<p>And the energy of <em>La Fiesta, Spain<\/em> and <em>500 Miles High<\/em>.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kent-video-wrapper\"><span class='embed-youtube' style='text-align:center; display: block;'><iframe class='youtube-player' type='text\/html' width='474' height='297' src='https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8eVuwsimbtw?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;fs=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;wmode=transparent' frameborder='0' allowfullscreen='true'><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p>So, jazz has lost one of its most fiercely creative legends; but we have the catalogue of recordings to explore, enjoy, and at which to marvel still. He will be missed.<\/p>\n<ul class=\"kent-social-links\"><li><a href='http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/2021\/02\/12\/captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea\/&amp;t=Captain Marvel: RIP Chick Corea' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-facebook' title='Share via Facebook'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='http:\/\/twitter.com\/home?status=Captain Marvel: RIP Chick Corea%20https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/2021\/02\/12\/captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea\/' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-twitter' title='Share via Twitter'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='https:\/\/plus.google.com\/share?url=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/2021\/02\/12\/captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea\/' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-google-plus' title='Share via Google Plus'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='http:\/\/linkedin.com\/shareArticle?mini=true&amp;url=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/2021\/02\/12\/captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea\/&amp;title=Captain Marvel: RIP Chick Corea' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-linkedin' title='Share via Linked In'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='mailto:content=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/2021\/02\/12\/captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea\/&amp;title=Captain Marvel: RIP Chick Corea' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-email' title='Share via Email'><\/i><\/a><\/li><\/ul>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The world of music is mourning the loss of Chick Corea, legendary jazz pianist and composer, who died on 9th February at the age of 79. A colossus of the jazz piano stage, his endless creativity can be heard fizzing across the decades, whether as part of the broiling textures of Bitches Brew or Black &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/2021\/02\/12\/captain-marvel-rip-chick-corea\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Captain Marvel: RIP Chick Corea<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":620,"featured_media":10445,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[936],"tags":[227881,227878,227880,227879],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10444"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/620"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10444"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10448,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10444\/revisions\/10448"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/music-matters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}