In 2004, he said that his album Solo Piano was a project that had relieved him of a variety of complexes that he had had about the relationship of his music to his character. How to sum up this singer, musician, entertainer? This record with a strong whiff of Satie solved a lot of problems, Jason Beck alias Chilly Gonzalez said at the time... A good decade later, this brilliant Canadian Zebedee bounds between passports, costumes, locations, eras and styles, always one step ahead of getting pigeonholed into a single role or genre. But he regularly returns to this solo, introspective work, as if compelled. This time, Solo Piano III rounds off what he describes as a trilogy. "The musical purity of Solo Piano III is not an antidote for our times", he says, "it is a reflection of all the beauty and ugliness around us. "
Less monolithic than its predecessors, this final volume racks up a series of refined nods and winks with a rare intelligence. Satie and Chopin are never far away, and the same goes for Liszt, Bach or, more recently, Chico Marx of the Marx Brothers, the childhood idol of his to whom he dedicated the well-named Chico. Each track on this timeless record is dedicated to one of his "underdogs". Thomas Bangalter of Daft Punk, Fanny Mendelssohn, sister of Felix Mendelssohn, Rudolf Steiner, founder of anthroposophy, composer and writer Hildegard von Bingen, aviator Amelia Earhart, the first woman to fly over the Atlantic in 1928, but also groups like Migos and Beach House or Conchita Cintron, the first woman rejoneadora: all are crowned with this pianist's laurels. © Max Dembo/Qobuz