2023-09-15 07:17:59
Friborg jazz pianist Thierry Lang publishes a 28th album entitled “Walk With Me”. A musical and melodic walk recorded in an Occitan studio in the company of six accomplices. He presents it with great orchestral pomp and with many guests at the Théâtre de l’Equilibre in Friborg on Saturday.
Thierry Lang brought together playing partners from Switzerland, France and Italy for a trip of ten relaxed stops. In the credits of “Walk With Me”, “music without fuss”, “melodically sunny” and “orchestrally colorful”, says Thierry Lang. The pianist brought alongside him the trombone of Denis Leloup, the harmonica of Olivier Ker Ourio, the guitar of Claude Schneider, the bass of Mimmo Pisino, the drums of Luigi Galati and the percussion of Andi Pupato.
The man who played with Toots Thielemans, Richard Galliano, Paolo Fresu and Tina Turner and published seven albums on the emblematic Blue Note label reveals his taste for swing, groove, blues, funk and even more melancholic ballads. Between attachment to the jazz tradition and desire to look towards the future.
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“At 15, I already knew that I wanted to go into jazz”
The trained classical pianist, now 66 years old and who created his first jazz trio in 1987, has not lost this musical flame sparked during his youth in Friborg: “I gave my first jazz concert at the “I was fifteen years old and I already knew that I wanted to move towards jazz music, swing, composition. Everything that makes up jazz got into me so deeply that it became an obsession”, recalls Thierry Lang.
But in reality, he knew since the age of seven, two years following he started performing, that he wanted to pursue a musical career. “I had spoken regarding it to my father who, at the time, did not want it, because I already had three older brothers who were not destined for a career as a doctor like him. He therefore hoped that the last of his sons follow that path.”
Thierry Lang also remembers very well the arrival of jazz in his life: “In the 1960s, my brothers were part of a twist orchestra and the musicians rehearsed in our house. I also heard swing at a very young age, because my brothers bought Count Basie or Erroll Garner records which I listened to loudly at the age of ten. I remember putting them on the family pickup and tapping the rhythm on the floor with the Mum’s knitting needles. This did not suit my father who had his consultation on the floor below and who frequently came up to give me a ‘brushing’.
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“I seek the beauty of melody”
Since then, Thierry Lang has revealed his melodic know-how, omnipresent on “Walk With Me”, his new project which he will continue on stage in Fribourg. Called “The Art of Melody”, this orchestral concert will be under the direction of conductor Emmanuel Fratianni who was his student at the Montreux Conservatory before a career in Hollywood and the United States.
The melody now seems to count more than anything in the eyes of the pianist and composer: “Coming from classical music, I was touched by the melodies. Those of Brahms, Chopin, Liszt are magnificent. And I have everything I immediately understood that I was going to move towards jazz or melodic music. What I am looking for is the beauty of melody, ‘putting together notes that love each other’, as Mozart said. And to accompany these tunes with complex harmonies so that it becomes interesting in terms of construction. This is still my primary concern today.”
The repertoire of “Walk With Me” turns out to be full of very accessible melodies. And Thierry Lang affirms that from now on he will only record composer albums.
Olivier Horner
Thierry Lang, “Walk With Me” (Universal Music).
In concert at the Théâtre de l’Equilibre, Fribourg, September 16, 2023. “The Art of Melody” in the company of, among others, the Friborg Chamber Orchestra, conductor Emmanuel Fratianni and the voices of Viktor Lazlo and Pascal Auberson .
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