Pianist Martial Solal was born in Algeria and moved to Paris in February 1950 to further his career in jazz. George Wein, the Newport Jazz Festival producer, invited Solal to appear at the 1963 festival, and arranged a few dates beforehand at New York’s Hickory House on 52nd Street to warm-up with an American rhythm team of Kotick and Motian (Bill Evans had gone alone to California at this time). The engagement was a huge success, his stay extended to six weeks, then 10. Word about this unknown French pianist had spread fast. Musicians, critics and the public came to marvel at the technique of Art Tatum, Bud Powell’s mastery of bebop and the lyrical poise and eloquence of Teddy Wilson all bound up in a highly original package.

Two weeks after his arrival in New York, Time magazine praised this “amazingly adept virtuoso… who pursues unconventional harmonic flights… with an imagination that is rich to the point of bursting.” These key elements are to the forefront of his Newport recording, plus one extra ingredient – his remarkable technique that comes gloved in service of brilliantly original melodic lines articulated with the delicacy of touch normally associated with a concert pianist.

His thematic variation and development on ‘Suite Pour One Frise,’ with its variations in tempo, immediately signal a pianist at one with his craft. His treatment of ‘Stella’ by Starlight’ and ‘’Round Midnight’ delve deeper into thematic development, this time on familiar tunes, where his variations retain thematic fragments that are spun through first, second and third variations that keep the listener transfixed.

The sheer eloquence of his treatment of ‘Poinciana,’ a recent hit for Ahmad Jamal, when it might be thought that he had said all that could be said on the subject, is carried out with an ease of execution that belies its technical accomplishment.

Producer George Avakain, who signed Miles Davis and Dave Brubeck to Columbia and guided Duke Ellington’s renaissance on the label, later wrote: “Martial Solal, Europe’s greatest jazz musician today, performs with Americans on their own terms as an equal – or even as a superior – his technique one of the most prodigious ever heard in jazz.” 

Martial Solal at Newport ‘63

RCA Victor

Martial Solal (p), Teddy Kotick (b) and Paul Motian (d). Rec. 7 July 1963