Peace Piece

Bill Evans piano composition

"Peace Piece" is a jazz piece recorded by Bill Evans in December 1958 for his album Everybody Digs Bill Evans. It is a pastoral improvisation done at the end of the recording session and is one of his simplest, built on a gentle Cmaj7 to G9sus4 two-chord progression that Evans had used earlier during the session for his version of "Some Other Time" from Leonard Bernstein's musical On the Town. It also reappeared in the opening to "Flamenco Sketches", which Evans recorded with Miles Davis the following year on the album Kind of Blue; Davis had taken a liking to the piece and wanted to reuse it.[1][2]

Although a peaceful piece, it contains many discordant notes in the latter half. The composition, with its free-form peaceful melody and timeless, meditational quality, has featured in numerous soundtracks of films and music in ballet choreography and has been recorded by fellow jazz musicians. It can be heard in Bo Widerberg's Love 65 (1965), Gaurav Seth's A Passage to Ottawa, Philip Seymour Hoffman's Jack Goes Boating (2010), and Dan Gilroy's Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017).[3] Pianists Richie Beirach,[4] Ricardo Fioravanti, Liz Story[5] and Stefano Battaglia,[6] the guitarists Stephen D. Anderson and Nino Josele, flautist Herbie Mann, and classical pianists Jean-Yves Thibaudet,[7] Roy Eaton, and Igor Levit have all recorded Peace Piece. The Kronos Quartet also recorded Peace Piece as a string quartet on the album Music of Bill Evans.[3]

Evans evokes the feeling of being alone in the piece and recalled that a teenage fan said that when he first heard it he "felt like he was standing all alone in New York".[3] Evans had many requests to play the piece live in his last years, but he refused because he believed that the composition would lose its value and meaning, as it had been an inspiration at the moment only. He only ever played it once live with the Bill Evans Dance Company in Seattle in 1978 to accompany an abstract and lyrical modern dance put on by the dancers.

Chuck Israels, later a bassist of the Bill Evans Trio, wrote of Peace Piece on his website:[3]

> Peace Piece is an example of the depth of Evans' compositional technique. It is an ostinato piece, composed and recorded long before the more recent superficial synthesis of Indian and American music; in fact, it owes more to Satie and Debussy than to Ravi Shankar. The improvisation starts simply over a gentle ostinato, which quickly fades into the background. Evans allows the fantasy that evolves from the opening motive (an inversion of the descending fifth in the ostinato) more freedom than he would in an improvisation tied to a changing accompaniment. He takes advantage of the ostinato as a unifying element against which ideas flower, growing more lush and colorful as the piece unfolds. Polytonalities and cross rhythms increase in density as the ostinato undulates gently, providing a central rhythmic and tonal reference. The improvisation becomes increasingly complex against the unrelenting simplicity of the accompaniment, until, near the end, Evans gradually reconciles the two elements."

Jacques Réda, a poet and jazz critic, has written a poem in French about Peace Piece.

Peace Piece bears some resemblance to Frédéric Chopin's Berceuse in Db major;[8] both pieces use a two-chord left-hand ostinato throughout, and they both have an ornamented melody line.

American jazz musician and YouTuber Charles Cornell notes that Bill Evans may have been influenced by Erik Satie's Vexations. [9]

## In popular culture

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The piece has been used in several films, including Corrina, Corrina in 1994 (performed by John Beasley), Peace Is Every Step in 1997 (Bill Evans version), Jack Goes Boating in 2010 (Bill Evans version), and Roman J. Israel, Esq. in 2017. Niemand in de stad (film) in 2018.

In 2003, text art collective Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries used "Peace Piece" in 0PERATI0N NUK0REA, a fictional story about the nuclear destruction of Seoul in a future war between South and North Korea.

## Covers

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The track 'Fix It' by Lady Blackbird from the 2021 album 'Black Acid Soul' uses Peace Piece as its musical base.

## References

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1. ^ Price, Emmett George (2010). Encyclopedia of African American music. ABC-CLIO. p. 458\. ISBN 978-0-313-34199-1. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
2. ^ Jazz journal international. Billboard Ltd. 2008. p. 14. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
3. ^ a b c d Peace Piece, BillEvans.nl
4. ^ Rusch, Bob (1 January 1993). Cadence. B. Rusch. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
5. ^ Jazz times. Jazztimes. 1982. p. 194. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
6. ^ Cadence. B. Rusch. 1995. p. 84. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
7. ^ The Advocate. 1997. p. 72. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
8. ^ Mawer, Deborah (2014). French Music and Jazz in Conversation. p. 231\. ISBN 9781107037533. Retrieved 4 February 2017.
9. ^ "The Music That is Actually MEANT to be IGNORED". YouTube. 3 December 2023.

* v
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Bill Evans

Discography

Studio
albums|

* New Jazz Conceptions
* Tenderly: An Informal Session
* Everybody Digs Bill Evans
* On Green Dolphin Street
* The Ivory Hunters
* Portrait in Jazz
* Know What I Mean?
* Explorations
* Nirvana
* Undercurrent
* Moon Beams
* How My Heart Sings!
* Interplay
* Empathy
* Loose Blues
* The Solo Sessions, Vol. 1
* The Solo Sessions, Vol. 2
* The Gary McFarland Orchestra
* Conversations With Myself
* Plays the Theme from The V.I.P.s and Other Great Songs
* Trio 64
* Stan Getz & Bill Evans
* Waltz for Debby
* Trio '65
* Bill Evans Trio with Symphony Orchestra
* Intermodulation
* A Simple Matter of Conviction
* Further Conversations with Myself
* Alone
* What's New
* From Left to Right
* Quiet Now
* The Bill Evans Album
* Living Time
* Eloquence
* Symbiosis
* Intuition
* The Tony Bennett/Bill Evans Album
* Alone (Again)
* Quintessence
* Together Again
* Crosscurrents
* I Will Say Goodbye
* You Must Believe in Spring
* New Conversations
* Affinity
* We Will Meet Again

Live
albums|

* Sunday at the Village Vanguard
* Waltz for Debby
* Time Remembered
* At Shelly's Manne-Hole
* Bill Evans at Town Hall
* The Bill Evans Trio "Live"
* California Here I Come
* Bill Evans at the Montreux Jazz Festival
* Jazzhouse
* You're Gonna Hear from Me
* Montreux II
* The Tokyo Concert
* Half Moon Bay
* Since We Met
* Re: Person I Knew
* But Beautiful
* Blue in Green: The Concert in Canada
* Montreux III
* Getting Sentimental
* Live in Buenos Aires 1979
* Homecoming
* The Paris Concert: Edition One
* The Paris Concert: Edition Two
* Turn Out the Stars: The Final Village Vanguard Recordings
* Letter to Evan
* Turn Out the Stars
* The Last Waltz: The Final Recordings
* Consecration: The Final Recordings Part 2

Compilation
albums|

* Piano Player

Compositions|

* "Waltz for Debby"
* "Funkallero"
* "Blue in Green"
* "Flamenco Sketches"
* "Time Remembered"
* "Peace Piece"

Band
members|

* Monty Budwig
* Larry Bunker
* Jack DeJohnette
* Eddie Gómez
* Chuck Israels
* Marc Johnson
* Philly Joe Jones
* Sam Jones
* Teddy Kotick
* Joe LaBarbera
* Scott LaFaro
* Michael Moore
* Marty Morell
* Paul Motian
* Gary Peacock

Associated
musicians|

* Cannonball Adderley
* Chet Baker
* Tony Bennett
* Bob Brookmeyer
* Kenny Burrell
* Ron Carter
* Miles Davis
* Stan Getz
* Jim Hall
* Freddie Hubbard
* Lee Konitz
* Harold Land
* Shelly Manne
* Warne Marsh
* Claus Ogerman
* George Russell
* Zoot Sims
* Toots Thielemans
* Monica Zetterlund

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Authority control databases |

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