Keith Jarrett at the Philharmonie Essen

Keith Jarrett performed at the Philharmonie Essen, and the journalists for the daily newspapers were (moderately) delighted. The audience seemed a bit intimidated by the admonitions of the Klavier Festival Ruhr's artistic director not to cough and by no means to take photographs. There were long, suspense packed passages, as Christoph Giese reports ( Kölnische Rundschau ).

Guido Fischer sees himself witnessing an act of creation when Jarrett "lives in one of his improvisation mantras and suffers, groans and moans, grunts and cheers, wails and stamps" ( Frankfurter Rundschau ). He praises Gary Peacock and Jack DeJohnette who both helped giving "poetic depth" to the standards played.

Wolfgang Sandner discerns a somewhat sterile atmosphere, "some kind of decency which gave the whole concert the strange flavor of 'well-meant', a fact probably not hidden to Keith Jarrett who reacted like a shy Arabian race horse" ( Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung ). As perfect and original as it all sounded - and Sandner does praise a lot -, the concert will not be counted among Jarrett's musical moments of glory.