Five of the Best Young Pianists

While this blog focuses on the music of established or deceased artists, we occasionally take a look at the younger musicians who constantly revitalize jazz and keep the music and the legacy alive. This post looks at five of the best young jazz pianists on the scene today.

Jonathan Batiste, who received a Masters degree from Juilliard, comes from a musical family in Louisiana and was introduced to music via the family band, the Batiste Brothers Band. In fact, he played percussion/drums for that group at age 8, before switching to piano around the age of 12. Batiste was listed on ARTINFO in 2012 as one of the "30 under 30" most influential people in the art world and currently serves as the Associate Artistic Director at the National Jazz Museum in Harlem. He currently tours with his band, Stay Human.

• His first album as a leader, Times in New Orleans, was released when Batiste was just 17 years old. All About Jazz critic Tod Smith called it "a rare opportunity to sample the work of a developing master." Six of the nine tracks — including the skillful "Misunderstood" and the stylish "Township" — are original compositions by Batiste, and there are also versions of jazz standards, like an innovative, syncopated take on Thelonious Monk's "Straight No Chaser." (Purchase the MP3 album from Amazon.com.)
• Social Music is the latest offering by Batiste and Stay Human, his current quintet. According to JazzTimes critic Carlo Wolff, this "perfectly titled album is a mash-up of time and tempo, jazz and pop, rhythm and blues, modern tunes and warhorses." Underlying the eclectic music is Batiste's energetic playing on the piano and the melodica. (Purchase the album from Amazon.com.)

Gerald Clayton, who was born in Utrecht, Netherlands, and raised in Southern California, won Downbeat's 2013 Rising Star award in the piano category. The son of bassist and bandleader John Clayton and the nephew of multi-instrumentalist wind player Jeff Clayton, Gerald took second place in the 2006 Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Piano Competition and has several Grammy nominations to his name. Clayton says of himself that "I prefer to ignore the boxes, the genre distinctions. I focus on creating honest musical expressions and collaborating with people whose ideas resonate with my own."

• Two-Shade was Clayton's debut album as a trio leader. Reviewer Michael G. Nastos called the album "an extremely sensitive and consistently satisfying effort that should bode well for his bright future, as he expounds on the personalized instrumental voice he has already discovered and established." The album ranges from original, funk-oriented pieces like "Boogablues" to an alluring version of the Cole Porter standard, "All of You," which earned Clayton a Grammy nomination for Best Improvised Jazz Solo. (Purchase the album from Amazon.com.)
• Clayton's latest album, Life Forum, features a larger group of musicians than his earlier, trio-focused albums. The result is an exciting disc that includes artists like trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire and singer Gretchen Parlato but also highlights what reviewer Matt Collar calls Clayton's "deft, nuanced piano chops, extensive, motivic improvisation, and broad, evocative compositional skills." (Purchase the album from Amazon.com.)

Aaron Diehl is a native of Columbus, Ohio, who was influenced by his grandfather, who played both piano and trombone. Diehl is a graduate of the Juilliard School and won the 2011 American Pianists Association Cole Porter Jazz Fellow competition as well as the 2013 Jazz Journalist Association's Up-And-Coming Musician of the Year Award. New York Times critic Nate Chinen praised Diehl's "melodic precision, harmonic erudition and elegant restraint, after the example set by his most direct influence, John Lewis."

• Diehl's classic technique can be heard on Live at the Players, an album that one blogger called "a wonderful album, which pays homage to the great tradition of jazz piano but updates it with changes in voicings, interesting interpretations, and some outstanding improvisations ..." Hard-driving covers of "Pick Yourself Up" and "Green Chimneys" highlight the album. (Purchase the MP3 album from Amazon.com.)
• The Bespoke Man's Narrative was described by All About Jazz critic Mark F. Turner as a "project [that] fully displays Diehl's musicality—exquisite touch, phrasing, and melodicism and intricate compositions ..." The title of the album suggests the elegance of two of Diehl's influences, Duke Ellington and John Lewis, and the music — especially his respectful version of Ellington's "Single Petal of a Rose" and a lighthearted rendition of "Moonlight in Vermont" — is equally stylish. (Purchase the album from Amazon.com.)

Taylor Eigsti is a native of California who performed with jazz pianist Dave Brubeck for the first time when he was 12. (Brubeck reportedly called Eigsti the most amazing talent he had ever come across.) Eigsti was the inaugural guest on NPR's "Piano Jazz: Rising Stars" program and was called by All About Jazz critic Chris May, "the most exciting progressive-mainstream pianist to come along in a very long time."

• Lucky to Be Me was Eigsti's major label debut and received two Grammy nominations. The album opens with a thoughtful, expressive version of the John Coltrane classic, "Giant Steps," and includes Eigsti's own compositions, like the fervent "Get Your Hopes Up." AllMusic critic Thom Jurek called the album "a mature, fiery, and surprising set by a talent who is still getting started while arriving fully formed as an artist." (Purchase the album from Amazon.com.)
• Let It Come to You also features a mix of standards — like a version of Pat Metheny's "Timeline" that features sizzling solos by Joshua Redman — and originals, three of which are combined into the varying, shifting "Fall Back Suite" that ends the album. (Purchase the album from Amazon.com.)

David Virelles was born and raised in Cuba and grew up in a musical family, with a father who was a singer-songwriter and a mother who was a classical flautist. He began studying classical music himself but turned to jazz after he discovered his grandfather's jazz collection. Virelles is a graduate of the music program at Humber College in Toronto and has won both the first-ever Oscar Peterson Prize and the Grand Prix de Jazz award at the 2006 Montréal Jazz Festival. He was also named one of four young pianists on the rise by The New York Times in 2011, where critic Ben Ratliff noted that Virelles is "making himself noticeable, breaking through with strong and hard-to-define patterns and sounds."

• Motion was the first album by Virelles. All About Jazz critic Raul D'Gama Rose called it "an explosive first outing" and said that "Sparks fly and the result is a marvelous amalgam of fiery sound that tantalizes in much the same way as saxophonist Wayne Shorter's music does." Pieces include Virelles's delicate tribute to his mother, "Mercedes," and the tangled, complex opening track, "Caminos." (Purchase the MP3 album from Amazon.com.)
• In his second album, Continuum, Virelles explores the myths and symbols of the Afro-Cuban folklore traditions through songs like the dark, tightly-packed centerpiece of the album, "Our Birthright."  The New York Times said that the album "sounds obsessed with tradition and newness and how they bleed into each other. All that is advanced enough. But doing it in a way that isn’t glib, that backs research with lots of intuition and risk, seems very special." (Purchase the album from Amazon.com.)

Robert
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