Keith Jarrett Trio
After The Fall

Keith Jarrett piano
Gary Peacock double bass
Jack DeJohnette drums
Producer: Keith Jarrett
Recorded live in concert
November 14, 1998
at New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC),
Newark, New Jersey
Engineer: Alain Leduc
Mastering: Rainbow Studio, Oslo
Executive producer: Manfred Eicher
Release date: March 2, 2018

After playing his last concerts in 1996, documented as A Multitude of Angels, Keith Jarrett was stricken with a bout of chronic fatigue syndrome that kept his hands away from the piano for two years. Only after that period of mystery and debilitation did he try to revive his trusted band with bassist Gary Peacock and drummer Jack DeJohnette. After a few rehearsals in the studio, he decided it was time to take a chance on the concert stage, doing so on November 14, 1998 for a performance at Newark, New Jersey’s new Performing Arts Center. If not for a touch of restraint, one might never know the difference, as Jarrett unpacks a formidable intro to their nearly 16-minute version of “The Masquerade Is Over” to kick off the evening’s revival. In addition to his obvious joy, one can bask in Peacock’s buoyancy and DeJohnette’s flowering metronome. Jarrett’s fingers are even more alive in the Charlie Parker standby “Scrapple From The Apple.” With the blessed assurance of this longstanding relationship, Jarrett gives us metaphysical nourishment of the highest archival order.

“Old Folks” dips his hands into a font of balladic wonders. As well in “When I Fall In Love” and Noel Coward’s “I’ll See You Again,” he builds emotional castles brick by meticulous brick, giving his all to the integrity of the entire proverbial kingdom. A characteristically luxurious take on the live staple “Autumn Leaves” offers 13 minutes of polished bliss. No signs of fatigue, physical or otherwise, can be read into this ecstatic rendition, especially as Peacock and DeJohnette offer surprises of their own in a brilliant triangulation of spontaneous invention. The concert’s upbeat excursions, in fact, offer some of its most head-nodding rewards. These include Bud Powell’s “Bouncin’ With Bud,” which unfurls a robust scroll of creativity; an exuberant take on “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town,” in which DeJohnette and Peacock blaze around every corner; and a muscular interpretation of John Coltrane’s “Moment’s Notice.” Neither does Jarrett concede anything close to fatigue in the denser geometry of Sony Rollins’s “Doxy” or Pete La Roca’s “One For Majid,” in which the trio flies high and swings low. And Jarrett’s sensitivity shines as brightly as ever in Paul Desmond’s “Late Lament,” for which he opens another eye for every one that he closes.

No one could have known what this concert would bring, that it would usher in a freer, more unrestricted era, or that it would unshackle Jarrett’s chains in favor of rebirth. But with this piece now restored for all to place into the puzzle of their appreciation, we find proof that old endings are only new beginnings in disguise.