Keith Jarrett is the most satisfying and, by most criteria, the most commercially successful of the younger crop of ex-Miles Davis pianists. He hasn't penetrated the pop Top Ten like Herbie Hancock but his recordings of solo acoustic piano improvisations, including the epochal three-record Solo-Concerts set, have sold better than the efforts of most players who'd hoped that plugging in would help them "relate." Jarrett's quartet records for ABC/Impulse, but his "special projects" on the Polydor-distributed ECM label have been his most widely talked about efforts. Luminessence consists of music for string orchestra and saxophone composed by Jarrett. Norwegian reedman Jan Garbarek is the soloist. His robust, melodious lines ride on a dense, singing string cushion, and the overall mood that emerges is romantically bittersweet, perhaps autumnal. Köln is a complete solo piano concert. The classical, baroque, gospel, boogie and impressionistic strains that crowded upon one another in some of the pianist's previous solo recordings have been synthesized here into a seamless whole of undeniable brilliance, with rolling ostinato rhythms that suggest the eternal movement of the sea. For the first time on record the music penetrates deeply into the trance-inducing areas pioneered by Terry Riley and La Monte Young. Almost anyone should be immediately attracted to it, and that's the really amazing thing about Jarrett. No matter what he writes or plays, he projects clarity, order and respect for tradition. He makes the most familiar melodic and harmonic vocabulary yield new, unexpected combinations. He never sounds avant-garde or alien but he always sounds fresh—and he seems to be well on his way toward transcending category entirely and becoming a popular performer in the truest and broadest sense. (RS 200)

ROBERT PALMER