Little Jazz Man
August 2, 2016 3:15 PM   Subscribe


will blow your mind.
Joey Alexander is an Indonesian jazz pianist and child prodigy. He released his first album, My Favorite Things, on May 12, 2015, at age 11. Joey is the youngest person to ever take the stage at the Newport Jazz Festival.

Featured on 60 Minutes where

viewers were treated to “Little Jazz Man,” a segment devoted to 12-year-old jazz pianist Joey Alexander, whose career is being closely followed by devotees of the music. The two-time Grammy nominee (including Best Jazz Album for his 2015 debut, My Favorite Things) has already performed on the main stages of Jazz at Lincoln Center and the Newport Jazz Festival, and has been described by Wynton Marsalis as “my hero.”
posted by shockingbluamp (18 comments total) 16 users marked this as a favorite
 
Lots of flashy chops, but that's often true of prodigies - all technique and no soul. The kid's definitely got promise, though, and I'm sure the soul will come as he gets older and more experienced.
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:45 PM on August 2, 2016 [5 favorites]




Kid's good.
posted by Doleful Creature at 3:59 PM on August 2, 2016


I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I'm not saying the guy's not flat-out amazing, I just don't think his playing is...what I'll call, for lack of a better term, "mature". To my ear. De gustibus, etc...
posted by Greg_Ace at 4:00 PM on August 2, 2016 [3 favorites]


I first heard about this kid from my brother, a somewhat accomplished jazz pianist, who sent me this recording and remarked on his monster technique, but more importantly noted the maturity of his ideas and musicality, which I think sets him apart from a lot of the other child prodigies that come and go... Someone to keep an eye out for.
posted by btfreek at 4:04 PM on August 2, 2016 [5 favorites]


Schroeder called. He wants his piano back.
posted by Chuffy at 4:39 PM on August 2, 2016 [1 favorite]


I'm with Greg Nog on this - clearly, he has excellent manual dexterity, fast reflexes, and good pattern recognition skills, but to me, what he's doing just isn't very interesting. YMMV, of course. Perhaps he'll develop more substance as he gets older, or perhaps all the attention he's getting now will just reinforce the idea in his head that what people really want to hear more than anything is a lot of notes played fast. Time will tell.
posted by Nat "King" Cole Porter Wagoner at 5:05 PM on August 2, 2016 [2 favorites]


I may have to change my username...this is the fourth or fifth time I've been mistaken for that august gentleman (no doubt to his distress). :-)
posted by Greg_Ace at 6:44 PM on August 2, 2016


When I was 11, I figured out how to find the Easter egg in Adventure on my Atari 2600.



The key is to take the bridge into the grey room and find the dot.
posted by 4ster at 7:11 PM on August 2, 2016 [1 favorite]


Good example of playing with feeling has to be Duke Ellington. Equal parts virtuoso and virtue.
posted by Taft at 7:27 PM on August 2, 2016


My apologies, Greg_Ace, for mixing you up with the other Greg, and to him as well, as I have no idea how he feels about Joey Alexander...
posted by Nat "King" Cole Porter Wagoner at 10:47 PM on August 2, 2016


Haters gonna hate, I guess. The kid's 12. Of course what he's doing is not "mature." That doesn't make it not amazing. Duke Ellington is mentioned above. He was in his 50s when he recorded "Reflections in D". He started piano lessons at age 7 and wrote his first music at 15 (according to Wikipedia) Give Joey a chance. He may have a "Reflections in D" in him, or something even more his own.
posted by chavenet at 1:47 AM on August 3, 2016 [1 favorite]


The video posted by jonathonhughes above is fantastic. Starts off a little stiff and wooden, and while the left hand does retain a little of that throughout, he relaxes into some real fluency and feel, and just wow. Worth sticking with it past the first minute or two.
posted by Dysk at 3:37 AM on August 3, 2016 [1 favorite]


One of the YouTube commenters said he was "Dorothy Donegan reincarnated." I'd never heard of her, but my research turned this up.
posted by BaffledWaffle at 4:48 AM on August 3, 2016


I don't know anything about technique, so I didn't get distracted by it. But I also don't know how you could listen to that and not get any feels from it.
posted by Flexagon at 6:38 AM on August 3, 2016


Thanks to this thread I went from Joey to Dorothy to Stephanie. Made my day.
posted by chavenet at 9:27 AM on August 3, 2016


Haters gonna hate, I guess. The kid's 12. Of course what he's doing is not "mature." That doesn't make it not amazing.

As I tried to make it clear before, I agree the kid's amazing and I wasn't expecting "maturity" from a 12-year-old. I'm okay with other people enjoying his playing.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:47 AM on August 3, 2016


Based on the "Sunny Side of the Street" video that johnathanhughes linked to, I'd say he's not shallow by any means. He's got a DEEP bag of tricks, one fresh rhythmic idea after another, serious ideas then jokes, quotes, to the point of sophistication.
posted by Rich Smorgasbord at 11:49 PM on August 3, 2016


« Older Americans call them...white trash. I call them......   |   Do not attempt to ford any river that is over 3... Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments