Best of Chick Corea on YouTube.

In honor of the recent concert done by the legendary Chick Corea, I decided to curate some of his best YouTube videos. The concert was held on January 25 at the Alys Stephens Theater.

The first of the videos is Chick playing on “Legends of Jazz”. His performance is spectacular and energizing, as always, but I thought there was a couple of other aspect that made this performance stand out to me. His use of parts of the piano that is not usually used made this piece unique to me. For example, when he muted the string with one hand and played a rhythm with the other hand was quite unique! His fluid transitions from one rhythm and tempo to another is extraordinary. I feel that this is part of what makes him such a good jazz musician. I also feel like there was an element of aesthetic pleasure to watching this performance rather than just listening to it. The way that he moves with the music and truly feels the music throughout is body is quite amusing.

The second of the videos is a bit longer. This excerpt is from the Chick Corea “Akoustic Band Alive” show during his earlier stages of his career. In this video Dave Wekl is the drummer and John Pattitucci is his upright bass player and man, what a vibe they create. This video has you taping your foot from beginning to end. I also love the use of dissonant by Corea. He makes them sound like they are in harmony.

This video definitely shows Corea’s other side. Firstly, he is not playing the regular piano, like in the other two video’s, which shows that he is truly a musician of variety. In the beginning of the song Corea is also showing us a more laid back style which is very different from his usual up-beat pieces. The vocal in this piece is also very unique and adds a lot to the overall feel of this piece. While the first video added an element with the visuals, this video has no visuals yet the music is as entertaining as the first video.

 

In this fourth and final video Corea shows us that he can really ‘jam’ with anyone. Who would have thought about mixing flute and jazz, but Corea makes an occasion of it. It is also amazing how through all of these videos Corea can surround himself with any musician and remain that feel of flow and togetherness. He does not have to stand back for any musician, he truly has an unbelievable talent.