Hank Jones, Consummate Jazz Pianist 1918-2010

There's been quite a lot of media coverage in the few days about extraordinary jazz pianist and superb human being, Hank Jones, with his passing on Sunday (May 16). All of us here in the Purdue Convocations family cannot but take a moment to stop and reflect on Hank and his incredible contributions to jazz, to music, and to humanity.

Purdue audiences will recall Hank Jones here in Loeb Playhouse back on March 28, 1997, as part of a killer show called the Detroit Jazz Allstars. I remember this show especially well because it was my first jazz concert here at Purdue as a newly-minted Convocations employee. The lineup featured Jones along with Marcus Belgrave (trumpet), Kenny Burrell (guitar), Frank Foster (sax), plus a rhythm section. It was clearly an evening spent in the presence of a tastemaker. As is often the case with elegant leadership (in aesthetics or otherwise), he didn't make it his businesses to steal the show with flash, but he gave everyone else the spotlight. When it was was his turn to solo, the sensibility in the room telescoped back down to minimalist perfection with Jones making each note count. It's hard to say whether each note was consciously or intuitively chosen--most likely it was both. But the effect was as if a 'sculptor of sound' shaped the world around us. He possessed a harmonic and rhythmic curiousity that evidenced his intellectual curiosity, and he could carve the most beautifully rendered, coherent, and emotionally complex phrases spontaneously. And he certainly did that night. I recall going home, digging through my jazz collection in vain hoping that I had something--anything--with Hank on it...

I called Don Seybold, former Assoc. Dir. of Convocations, who was the founder of the jazz programming here at Convocations, and is all around instigator of jazz for the good of humanity, to check in on his thoughts about Hank. He told me this story from the Detroit Jazz Allstars night:

As was my tradition, I would introduce the band, and I remember very clearly what I said about Hank because right after the show, he came back and told me how much he appreciated what I said, which was: "When you listen to Hank play, it's not so much that he's playing the keys, but more that he's lifting them up and drawing the music up and out of the piano." He'd had lots of introductions in his career, but apparently that one really meant a lot to him, which is, of course, why I remember that exchange with him to this day. He was the consummate elegant and eloquent gentleman.

(Of course, jazz fans in the area also know that Don Seybold also has a terrific jazz radio show, Inside Jazz, on Sunday nights on WBAA-AM 920, 9p-midnight. He's told me that he will do a Hank Jones tribute show later in the summer, so tune in to his broadcasts for details.)

The Jones legacy is strong here at Purdue. Hank's late brother, drummer Elvin Jones, played at Purdue in 1993. And this season, a band created in 1966 by their brother, the multitalented composer, arranger, and bandleader Thad Jones, The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra holds sway this coming January 2011.

Thanks, Hank. We'll miss you. And we'll try our darnedest to incorporate refinement, thoughtful understatement, and subtlety into a world that needs it.

Jazz radio update: Don Seybold will host a Hank Jones tribute program on Inside Jazz on Sunday, August 1, 2010, on WBAA-AM 920, 9p-midnight. Be sure to tune in!