Still At Sea

If you're interested in hearing Kirk Nurock at the top of his game, try Still at Sea, a collection of live recordings collated from four different solo performances. As the composer/pianist's first live recording of both well-known jazz compositions and two originals that are still finding an audience, Nurock travels to different eras, from New Orleans to postmodernism. Among the wondrous jazz standards is a relentless version of Irving Berlin's "Always" that he fills with gorgeous hues and cascades of single-note and octave unison passages. Later in the program, Nurock uses a resilient combination of styles to open up and achieve the melodic ideas of Duke Ellington. "Do Nothin' Til You Hear From Me" features a boogie-woogie, stride, and barrelhouse treatment, while "Solitude" explores a myriad of lush, sweet chord voicings that explain just how comfortable Nurock is with improvising Ellington's memorable melodies. "Still at Sea" and "Morning at Michael's — the two originals penned by Nurock — illuminate his gracefulness at any tempo and his ability to elicit new musical ideas among a treasury of golden oldies. Soulful, heartfelt, and iconoclastic, this solo piano program offers consistent playing and a viable intellectual and sensitive solo style and is unlike any performance offered with his trio on Kirk Nurock's previous 1998 release, Remembering Tree Friends.