Martial Solal died on December 12th; he was 97. The Algeria-born French pianist had been active in Europe since the 1950s. He performed with Django Reinhardt, Stéphane Grappelli, Don Byas, Astor Piazzolla, Claude Bolling, Lucky Thompson, Sidney Bechet, Kenny Clarke, and many other figures. He had a long collaboration with Lee Konitz which began in 1968.
He composed around 20 film scores, notably the score for Jean-Luc Godard’s debut feature film Breathless (1960). He appeared at the 1963 Newport Jazz Festival, though his piece on the album for that event is a studio recreation with audience noise added. His style was intellectual, but he was fond of inserting musical jokes in his performance. His association with classic French cinema helped him to become one of the best known jazz musicians in France, where his public career continued through 2019.
