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Biography |
by Joseph Stevenson
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Jacques Loussier is a conservatory-trained French pianist whose greatest musical successes have been as an arranger and player of jazz crossover arrangements. He is also well known as a producer of recordings for popular and rock artists. In 1959 Loussier founded the "Play Bach" Trio to play and record his jazz-style arrangements of compositions of Johann Sebastian Bach. Remaining faithful to Bach's original contrapuntal lines and harmonic structures, Loussier wrote his arrangements for a traditional modern jazz trio of piano, bass, and drums. He took as his point of departure the Modern Jazz Quartet's famous Blues on Bach album.
In style, the 1959 - 1970 trio's jazz was close to that of the MJQ or the Dave Brubeck Quartet at the time. Loussier's group was highly successful; their four albums sold more than six million copies on the Decca label. Then popular interest in this style of music waned, and the trio disbanded in 1970.
Loussier withdrew from the concert stage to compose and record his own music at his home in Provence in southern France. His home studio was so well equipped that other musicians, especially in the rock field, wanted to record there. Perhaps the most famous work produced there was a chunk of Pink Floyd's The Wall LP.
In 1985, the year of the Bach tricentennial, Loussier revived the concept of the "Play Bach" Trio by founding the Jacques Loussier Trio; the group consists of Loussier, Vincent Charbonnier (bass), and André Arpino (drums). Recording for Telarc Jazz, the new trio has released successful CD albums of adaptations of Bach, Vivaldi, and Satie. |
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