Iiro Rantala: My Working Class Hero

Rating: ★★★

Record and Artist Details

Musicians:

Iiro Rantala (p)

Label:

ACT

September/2015

Catalogue Number:

9597-2

RecordDate:

21 April 2015

It's not impossible to imagine that, half a century ago, some people's first exposure to the music of The Beatles came via jazz. For instance, when it charted in 1964, Ella Fitzgerald's cover of ‘Can't Buy Me Love’ would have alerted a generation of older US listeners to the starting British Invasion. These days, pop comes before jazz in most musical educations: singing in his school choir, Iiro Rantala discovered ‘Happy Xmas, War Is Over’ long before he discovered Miles, Trane and the rest of that improvising-mad posse. The experience made a profound impression on the young chorister, and here the Finnish pianist offers a 12-song homage to the song's co-writer John Lennon (Yoko is credited too), drawing on both his solo and group work – there's even a cover of ‘Just Because’, which was written by Lloyd Price and covered by Lennon on his 1975 Rock ‘N’ Roll album). ‘How can this guy write something so simple and yet so powerful at the same time?’ Rantala remembers wondering at the time of his Lennon initiation. And that's the crux of the album he's recorded here – on the Steinway D concert grand used by Alfred Brendel across several decades when he performed with the Philharmonie in Berlin – how to make something less simple (does jazz really like simplicity?) but equally powerful. You'll recognise melodies, delivered directly or in more delayed, semi-concealed form: ‘Woman’ comes with a funked-up middle section; after a powerful chordal-pulse introduction, ‘Norwegian Wood’ is made to waltz. It's clever but also winningly heartfelt.

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