Bachanal rag player piano
Word-of-mouth reputation spurred these face-to-face confrontations between established players and upstart rookies in jam-packed, smoke-filled Harlem nightclubs. He thrived on “cutting contests,” musical duels that pit the skills of two competing musicians before enthusiastic and often biased audiences. Neither was a reported mugging which injured Tatum’s eyesight further when he was a teenager.Īlthough he had some early childhood training, Art Tatum was largely self-taught. Surgery was attempted, but wasn’t very successful. The World’s Greatest Pianist was nearly blind. I am listening to the world’s greatest piano player.” A music professor who had arrived earlier to listen saw Rubenstein come in and walked up to Rubenstein and said, “Maestro, this is not your usual habitat.” Perhaps the greatest classical pianist of the 20th century, Artur Rubenstein, famous for his incomparably deft and lyrical interpretations of Chopin, frequented Harlem’s Onyx Club where Tatum regularly hung out. I was down in Harlem listening to Art Tatum and I was fascinated by his music.” The second clarinetist meekly replied, “Um, he died yesterday, sir.” Toscanini immediately shot back, “That’s no excuse!”)īut even the stickler Toscanini explained to a black tie audience when he arrived an hour late to a Carnegie Hall concert performance, “I’m sorry.
“Where’s the first clarinetist?” he immediately demanded of the clarinetist in the next chair. (One time when he tapped his baton on his music stand for a rehearsal he noticed that the first-chair clarinetist’s chair was empty. He held his musicians to the highest of standards. Toscanini was one of the fiercest and most strict conductors to have ever lived. But Tatum was black in an era when the top concert draws were white.Ĭonductor Arturo Toscanini would always seek out Tatum whenever he came to New York to conduct. Tatum did play serious music, it happened to be jazz. Top musicians in the 1930s and 40s and 50s would trek to Harlem clubs to hear him play ? Gershwin, Horowitz, Godowski, Rachmaninoff, Geseking, Paderewski? Rachmaninoff told the press, “If this man ever decides to play serious music we’re all in trouble.” The Furies must have gathered around his crib at birth, something infernal slipped into his mother’s milk.” But God is in the house tonight,” when he spotted Art Tatum in the audience.Īrthur Fiedler, conductor of the Boston Pops, once said, “There’s a demonic, almost diabolical quality to his playing.
When Vladimir Horowitz, the famed classical pianist, was asked who the best pianist was, he responded with Art Tatum’s name.Įven Fats Waller, a very accomplished pianist in his own right and one of Tatum’s favorites, was reported to have said, “I’m just a piano player. People who saw him play were heard to exclaim, “My God! His hands are a blur!” ? “Tapping to his uptempo performances is like trying to match a hummingbird’s wings.” ? “The apotheosis of jazz instrumentalists.”
? “The greatest virtuoso performer in the history of jazz.” ? “He could identify the dominant note in a flushing toilet.” ? “One of the few musicians that people will still be listening to 100 years from now.” ? “A style and technique never equaled in its sophistication and brilliance.” ? “The greatest jazz pianist that has ever lived. ? “What God himself would play for solo jazz piano” ? “Made even old warhorses sound like new compositions.” ? “?criticized for having ‘too much technique’ (is such a thing possible?)” ? “Harmonically 30 years ahead of his time” ? “Always scared the competition.” ? “?wondrous technique” ? “ridiculously rapid and extended lines with both hands.” Here’s a sampling of what fellow musicians and critics have said about him. It’s almost impossible to evoke good music in print, especially the dazzling and extraordinary sound of the world’s greatest pianist, Art Tatum.