Jacques Loussier


Jacques Loussier was a French pianist and composer. He arranged jazz interpretations of many of the works of Johann Sebastian Bach, such as the Goldberg Variations. The Jacques Loussier Trio, founded in 1959, played more than 3,000 concerts and sold more than 7 million recordings—mostly in the Bach series. Loussier composed film scores and a number of classical pieces, including a Mass, a ballet, and violin concertos. Loussier's style is described as third stream, a synthesis of jazz and classical music, with an emphasis on improvisation.

Early life

Loussier was born on 26 October 1934 in Angers, France. He started piano lessons there aged ten. When he was eleven, he heard a piece from the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach. In a 2003 interview, he said "I was studying this piece and I just fell in love with it. Then I found I loved to play the music, but add my own notes, expanding the harmonies and playing around with that music." At 13, he met the pianist Yves Nat in Paris, who regularly gave him projects for three months, after which he returned for another lesson.

Career

Loussier began composing music while studying at the Conservatoire National Musique, having moved by then to Paris, with Nat, from the age of 16. At a competition at the conservatory, he played a prelude by Bach, and when his memory failed, improvised. He later said that he only followed a tradition, because musicians of the 18th century were great improvisers, Bach among them. Loussier played jazz in Paris bars to finance his studies. Fusing Bach and jazz was unique at the time. After six years of studies, Loussier traveled to the Middle East and Latin America, where he was inspired by different sounds. He stayed in Cuba for a year. Loussier's style is described as third stream, a synthesis of jazz and classical music, with emphasis on improvisation.
Early in his career, Loussier was an accompanist for the singers Frank Alamo, Charles Aznavour, Léo Ferré and Catherine Sauvage. In 1959, he formed the Jacques Loussier Trio with string bass player Pierre Michelot—who had played with Django Reinhardt and the Quintette du Hot Club de France—and percussionist Christian Garros. They used Bach's compositions as a base for jazz improvisation and made many live appearances, tours, and concerts, as well as a number of recordings. The trio began with Decca Records but changed to Philips/Phonogram in 1973. They sold over six million albums in 15 years. Their best known recording is "Air on the G String", which was used to advertise the Hamlet brand of cigar in the UK for over 30 years. The trio played more than 3,000 concerts.
In the mid 1970s, the trio was dissolved. Loussier set up his own recording studio, Studio Miraval, which opened in 1977, where he worked on compositions for acoustic and electric instruments. He recorded with musicians such as Pink Floyd, Elton John, Sting, Chris Rea, and Sade. Parts of Pink Floyd's album The Wall were recorded at his studio.
In 1985, the tricentenary of Bach's birth, Loussier revived the trio with the percussionist André Arpino and the bassist Vincent Charbonnier. The bassist Benoit Dunoyer de Segonzac has also performed in the trio, replacing Charbonnier—whose left hand was affected by a stroke, resulting in his being unable to continue to play the bass—on a number of albums and concerts from at least as early as 1998. Besides Bach, the trio recorded interpretations of compositions by Handel, Scarlatti, Vivaldi, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Satie, Debussy, Ravel, and Schumann. A 2005 recording titled Take Bach, made by the trio along with the Pekinel sisters, features adaptations of Bach's concertos for two and three pianos. Loussier's last albums, My Personal Favorites and Beyond Bach, Other Composers I Adore, were released in 2014, on the occasion of his 80th birthday.
In March 2002, Loussier filed a $10 million lawsuit against rapper Eminem and The Marshall Mathers LP executive producer Dr. Dre, claiming that the beat for the track "Kill You" was stolen from his composition Pulsion. He demanded that all sales of the album be halted and any remaining copies destroyed. The case was settled out of court.

Death

Loussier suffered a stroke during a performance at the Klavier-Festival Ruhr on 14 July 2011, and retired from the stage. He died on 5 March 2019 at the age of 84.

Compositions

Loussier composed the music for over 100 films, made for cinema and television series, beginning with The Happy Sixties in 1963. These included the scores for the films Heaven on One's Head, Living It Up, The Killing Game, Dark of the Sun, Monique and The Man Who Went Up in Smoke, the theme tune for the popular 1960s French TV series Thierry la Fronde, and the original sign-on music for La 3e chaîne, the predecessor television channel to France 3.
Loussier also composed a trumpet concerto, two violin concertos, and music for a ballet, among other pieces. His Mass, Lumières: Messe Baroque du 21e Siècle, has been compared to Leonard Bernstein's Mass.

Recordings

Jacques Loussier