That encounter with the Rhodes piano had, nonetheless, been dramatic for him. It came just after he had taken up Scientology and, with it, began to wonder about the effect he could have in the world. He had never wondered about it before.
尽管如此,与罗德斯钢琴的相遇还是挺戏剧性的。当时他刚皈依山达基教,开始思考自己能给世界带来什么影响,之前他从未思考过这个问题。
Growing up in Chelsea, Massachusetts, he spent hours experimenting on the piano, alone in his bedroom into which the piano, like a spacecraft, had had to be hoisted by a crane. His father was a Dixieland trumpeter; music sang round the house, and the joy it gave him did not seem to need sharing.
他在马萨诸塞州的切尔西长大,他经常花费数小时在自己的卧室里弹奏钢琴,这架钢琴就像宇宙飞船一样,必须得用起重机才能挪进卧室。他父亲在迪克西兰爵士乐乐队里吹小号,家里到处都是音乐声,这种氛围带给他的快乐似乎都不需要分享。
Now he thought it did. Music was a story he could tell, to fill people’s imaginations. He noticed, too, how stars like the Beatles sold themselves as entertainers to huge crowds, while jazz-players still haunted their smoky clubs. He wanted to play innovative, heart-lifting jazz on a rock-star scale, too.
而现在,他改变主意了。音乐是他能够讲述的故事,可以帮助人们丰富想象力。他还注意到,像披头士这样的明星如何把自身包装成拥有大量粉丝的偶像,而爵士乐手仍然进出于他们灯红酒绿的俱乐部。他也想以摇滚明星的水准为更多观众演奏流行的、振奋人心的爵士乐。
To the fury of purists (people with no curiosity, he thought) jazz fusion became a great commercial success. But he was still exploring. Even as fusion arrived he was playing avant-garde acoustic stuff, indulging his wild, atonal, piano-string-plucking side with a group called Circle.
融合爵士乐取得了巨大的商业成就, 这令纯粹主义者(科瑞亚自认,这就是一群缺乏好奇心的人)勃然大怒。但他仍不断进行探索。即使融合音乐兴起初期,他依然和“Circle”乐队合作,演奏前卫派原声乐,沉迷于自己狂野、无调的钢琴弦乐混搭之中。
Later on, with fusion all the rage, he played sessions with his friend Herbie Hancock on a couple of concert grands, duels of improvisation on anything from Duke Ellington to Bartok’s “Mikrokosmos”. He loved the family rapport of bands, but also needed every so often to check out the world alone. Synthesisers quickly followed the Rhodes piano, but he seldom gave up the chance to commune with a Steinway—even if sometimes in trainers, or in one of his Hawaiian shirts.
后来,随着融合音乐逐渐风靡,他与朋友赫比·汉考克(Herbie Hancock)在几场大型音乐会上搞起了即兴音乐演奏,涵盖了从艾灵顿公爵(Duke Ellington)的作品到巴托克(Bartok)的《Mikrokosmos》等等类型的音乐。他很享受乐队里亲人般的关系,但他也需要时不时地孤身去感受音乐世界。音乐合成器很快取代了罗德斯钢琴,但只要有机会弹奏施坦威钢琴,就算是穿着运动鞋或是夏威夷衬衫,他也丝毫不放过任何机会。
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