The wrong piano

Univ.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. Rolf Breitenbücher ;

Chairman German Committee
for Reinforced Concrete

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Udo Wiens;

Managing Director
Deutscher Ausschuss für Stahlbeton e.V.

Recently, on a rainy winter weekend, while going through my record collection, I came across “The Köln Concert” by Keith Jarret from 1975. It felt like half an eternity since I had last listened to this brilliant solo performance by the greatest jazz pianist of the past sixty years. Having become curious, I searched Wikipedia for more information about the concert and found the following: As with other solo concerts given by Keith Jarrett, “The Köln Concert” was freely improvised. The artist aims to create music “out of nothing”, without any musical forethought and without plan. He himself said about this approach: “It is as if I were naked every time I come on the stage. The most important thing in every solo concert is the first note that I play, or the first four notes. When they have enough tension, the rest of the concert follows almost by itself.”

The warm-up for the Köln concert took place under extremely adverse circumstances. Keith Jarrett had hardly slept the night before the concert. He had left Switzerland, together with his producer, Manfred Eicher, in the early morning hours in a rattletrap R4. Owing
to some misunderstanding, instead of the grand piano he had
requested, a so-called “Stutz” (baby grand) piano had been set up. It was actually intended for rehearsals only and was out of tune. The pedals and some keys did not work properly. His dinner before the concert arrived only a quarter of an hour before he returned to the Köln Cologne Opera House. Jarret agreed to perform only at the express request of the local 18-year-old organizer, Vera Brandes. The team had already been about to cancel the live recording when the sound technicians finally agreed to record the sold-out concert, with 1,4000 in the audience, for private use. Keith Jarrett adapted the musical performance to the available instrument and largely restricted himself to the medium and lower ranges, preferring
repetitive patterns. The result was simply overwhelming. Until now, the Köln concert by Keith Jarrett has been the bestselling jazz solo record and the bestselling piano solo record ever.

In these times of transformation in our industry, we truly need great ability for improvisation, paired with modesty and the ability to adjust to the adverse circumstances currently perceived as threatening.
With only a few available tools and creative engineering prowess, we are indeed able to make a significant contribution to climate protection and resource conservation in concrete construction – and to make a flying start into the future. The result will speak for itself.

In this sense I wish all participants of the BetonTage – as always – much enjoyment with the enrichment of your expertise.

Yours,