Piano fest in tune with Zeitgeist
Boston Herald, Music News
Saturday, September 13, 2003
By Bob Young

So many pianists, so little time.

That's the only lament Zeitgeist Piano Festival organizer Gill Aharon has about today's second annual event that showcases 23 pianists for 13 - that's right, 13 - straight hours.

Aharon is thrilled about the music at the festival, which kicks off at the Zeitgeist Gallery in Cambridge at noon today and slips into the wee hours of tomorrow before the last note fades.

``Next year I'm thinking about doing it over the whole weekend,'' said Aharon, the gallery's resident pianist.

Given the growing demand from keyboard players who want to be part of the festival, Aharon might have no other choice. As it is, he has a slate of players encompassing ``desperately different styles'' who rank among the city's most inventive.

Thomas Luther opens the festival and Aharon himself closes it, while there's enough diversity in between to keep it eclectic day and night. Greg Burk, Vardan Ovsepian, David Maxwell, Jacques Chanier, Dan DeChellis and Hans Poppel are on board, as are Kobi Arad and Manisha Shahane.

``I try to get pianists who are not just experimental, but who keep working hard,'' said Aharon, who added that he gave first dibs to Zeitgeist Gallery regulars. ``As long as people love playing and aren't into it for some other reason, I don't care about the styles.''

It was that kind of passion that drove Aharon to be at the Zeitgeist in the first place. After hosting performances - illegally - for three years at his Fishlung Studio in Charlestown, the Duke University graduate was kicked out and he moved to Dorchester, where he treated himself to a brand-new 7-foot Kwai piano.

The problem: He wasn't playing it nearly enough. So when the Zeitgeist Gallery moved to its new location in Inman Square, he offered to put the piano into the first-floor space.

He soon ended up moving into the apartment upstairs.

``The Zeitgeist is like my living room,'' he said. ``I go downstairs in the morning and practice and then I teach there in the afternoon. I close it up at night. It's great.''

More and more musicians with a nonmainstream bent feel the same way about the gallery, which accommodates more than 70 comfortably. The Fringe soon will make the Zeitgeist its regular home on Monday nights.

``The short of it is that there was no venue for guys like me who are writing music that doesn't fit exactly into the connotation of what jazz is,'' said Aharon, who studied at Berklee College of Music with Ray Santisi and Charlie Banacos. ``The reason I (moved my piano in) was because there aren't venues with a real good piano that will entertain alternative approaches to jazz or any other music.''

Most jazz clubs with good pianos, he believes, lean toward straight-ahead artists. ``Unless you're a giant,'' Aharon said, ``and then you can play wherever you want.

``But if you're in that in-between place where you don't have a great record deal or somebody backing you, it's hard to get into those places.''

That is why Aharon and many others couldn't be happier with the Zeitgeist.

``It's a womb where people can come and be comfortable and not distracted,'' he said. ``To me, it's like a fantasy place.''