Fu followed the staff around the group of jazz musicians who were blindly laughing and walked to the back of the bar, that is, to the door next to the counter.

Originally, Fu Tiao thought that this place should be a rest room for the staff or some place to store drinks, but he didn't expect that this place was actually a separate lounge.

Although this lounge is still decorated in the same style as the previous bar, the décor is completely different in some details.

There are a lot of soundproofing and benches for resting, and the table in the middle is not a barrel with a wooden plank on top, but a table made entirely of unknown wood.

Although the overall appearance is still like that kind of country bar-style decoration, to be honest, this place is actually more like the decoration of the owners of the southeast coastal areas of Huaguo.

That is, the chair they use is the kind of wood without a backrest, and if they change to the square carved wooden chair of Huaguo, then there is really a feeling of traveling back to Huaguo in a second.

In the corner of the room there was an additional piano, an upright piano, not the large triangle outside the room.

The soundproofing equipment in this room is very good, and when Fu Tiao walks into the room and closes the door, he can clearly feel that the surrounding sound is much quieter, and even if he doesn't pay attention to it, he can't hear it clearly.

And in this room sat an old man with gray hair.

He was not dressed properly, but wore a very simple white shirt, with a huge toad glass, and slowly sipped in that place with a glass of simple transparent liquid.

Looking at the degree of hanging glass of the liquid above, it is clear that it is not ordinary mineral water, but a distilled spirit similar to liquor, vodka, rum and the like.

He didn't drink much, maybe a 2cl cup, and he didn't drink a tenth of it for a long time in that place.

Judging from his movements, it seems to be extremely elegant, just like the conjecture of the artist in everyone's mind.

Especially old artists.

Merely......

When he saw Fu Diao coming in from the door of the house, he nodded slightly and said to the bar owner behind Fu Diao.

"Boss, sorry for the trouble, thank you."

"You're welcome, you guys talk slowly, if there's anything you want to drink, just tell me, I'll be satisfied."

"Then get me a bottle of Coke by the way, I still can't get used to this vodka, I really don't understand why so many of them like to drink this kind of wine so much."

When Kapustin heard this, he immediately put aside the wine glass in his hand, breathed a sigh of relief, and the elegance in his bones suddenly dissipated most of it, and looked at Fu Diao and said with a smile similar to that of an old naughty boy.

"Fu, you also talk to the boss, let him bring it in later."

"I'll forget it, let's have a glass of mineral water, unsparked, don't want San Pellegrino Perrier, the San Pellegrino I just gave me is too sour, just have a softer sparkling water."

"Okay!"

The boss nodded, and immediately left, and when Fu Tiao sat opposite Kapustin, the boss also brought the water that Fu Tiao asked for and the Coke that Kapustin wanted.

"The water you want, and the Pepsi sugar-free you want, Mr. Kapustin."

"You really haven't forgotten that I like to drink Pepsi sugar-free, Coca-Cola's sugar-free taste is really terrible, if there is a sugar version of Coke, I still recommend Coca-Cola, Pepsi is to brush the pot water, but the unsweetened version, Pepsi is king!"

Kapustin's eyes lit up when he looked at the Coke bottle that was still air-conditioned, and without waiting for the boss to bring the starter, he directly knocked it against the table leg, and the boss's eyes were straight, and he was extremely distressed.

"Sure enough, it's still the glass bottle of Coke that has the most flavor and tastes the best."

"No, my ......"

The boss looked at Kapustin speechless for a long time, and finally could only sigh, rub his head and walk out, as if he didn't see it.

And Fu Tiao also sat in his place, opened the bottle of mineral water on the table, took a casual sip, and said to Kapustin.

"You're looking for me...... What's the matter? I heard my teacher say that you seem to be a very good jazz musician. ”

"Jazz musicians?" After taking a big sip of Pepsi sugar-free, Kapustin grinned comfortably: "I'm not a jazz musician, to be honest, I just think I'm a very, very ordinary musician, that's all." ”

"Huh?"

Fu was puzzled and listened quietly to Kapustin's words.

Kapustin said casually.

"I've never been a jazz musician, and I've never tried to be a real jazz pianist, it's just that I had to do that in my composition, and I'm not interested in improvisation, and a jazz musician without improvisation can be a jazz musician? All my 'improvisations' are created and used to improve my work, can you understand? [Note 1]

“……”

Fu Tiao didn't expect that the first thing Kapustin said when he came over was to say this to him, and he didn't particularly understand what Kapustin wanted to do for a while.

If he doesn't like improvisation, then why is he calling himself over?

Because in any case, Fu Tune thinks that he is also a jazz musician, and he is very concerned about improvisation in music.

As in his performance, if something appears in the impromptu that he does not understand, he will immediately have a little doubt, and then try to understand it, add it to his improvisation, and not resist it.

Unexpectedly, the first thing Kapustin said to him was to express his resistance, saying that he didn't like the improvisation in music.

Fu Tiao only nodded slightly, waiting for Kapustin's speech later.

Kapustin didn't think much of it, just continued.

"But although I don't really recognize my own status in the jazz circle, there are still many people who call me the most classical music in the jazz circle, the composer who knows the most about jazz in classical music, and one of the greatest jazz composers of the 20th century, and I have to admit that jazz has given me a lot of inspiration, just like Hiromi Ishihara who is also outside."

Kapustin pointed to Hiromi Ishihara outside the room, then pointed to his ear and smiled.

"Although you are old, I can hear all your performances outside, and I know what you are playing, I have to admit that you have given me a lot of inspiration, and your performance is also very in line with my aesthetics of jazz, especially you, Fu!"

"Me? Do I play? Fu was stunned.

Kapustin nodded very seriously and said to Fu Tune: "Yes, it's your performance, you may not think your performance is good, and even think that your performance is too simple, classical, and there is nothing new in it, but for me, I like your performance very, very much, and what I like is the classical part of your music, because I am also like this." ”

With that, he got up and walked to the package on the side, took out his package, took out a sheet of music from it, handed it to Fu Tuo, and said casually.

"This is my work, Daybreak, a ...... Not a bad piano piece. ”

Fu Tiao took the work he handed over and looked at it slowly, and couldn't help but be a little stunned.

This piece has a very, very obvious melody in his head, and this melody is a very typical jazz piece, so typical that it can't be more typical, you just listen to the beginning of this and you can feel that this is a jazz work.

But as Kapustin said, he didn't write jazz.

While this piece feels jazzy, what this piece presents on the score is not at all what a jazz piece should present.

One of the most striking features of jazz is improvisation, which is the soul of jazz.

There are even many people who say that jazz is an art of improvisation, and only improvisation can express the whole imagination of the performers at that time and their artistic charm.

And this pianist, who is known as the most jazz pianist in classical music, does not have the slightest improvised element in his works.

But if this work is classical...... No matter what period it is, people will not admit that this is a classical work.

At the heart of this work is jazz and nothing else.

Looking at all this, Fu Tiao couldn't help but be dazed for a while, looked back and forth two or three times, and finally looked at Kapustin and asked.

"This ...... Is it a jazz work? ”

"To be precise, it's a classical work with jazz as the core logic of creation, haven't you found a part in it that allows you to improvise?"

Seeing this, Kapustin couldn't help laughing, then shook his head helplessly, pointed to his head.

"I told you, I'm a composer, I'm not a jazz musician, so I don't let improvisation come too much into my music, not because I don't want to, but because ...... I can't. ”

"Huh?"

Fu Tiao always felt that his head might be a little confused, and couldn't help repeating: "It's not that I don't want to, but I can't?" Mr. Kapustin, are you sure...... You didn't say the opposite? ”

"Yes, I'm not saying the opposite, it's what you think."

Kapustin interrupted Fu Tuo's words and said with a smile.

"I just can't do it, it's not that I don't want to, it's just because I can't do it."

"Do...... Not? ”

"Well, my head can't work, this place." Kapustin poked his skull and said with a smile: "This place is not good, it is not good since I was a child." ”

He didn't give Fu Tiao room to speak, and continued directly.

"There are not so many whys, in fact, there is only one problem for me, that is, I can't create an improvisational work, it's that simple, although I can write a more perfect improvisation after the performance, an improvisation that everyone praises, but this is not improvisation after all, but something that I can write down after thinking for a long time......"

"So, I'm very entangled, especially for you jazz musicians."

Kapustin got up and opened the door a little bit to let in the music outside.

He listened to the music on the stage and said slowly.

"First of all, I envy you jazz musicians very much, your brains are very flexible, and you can improvise so many beautiful jazz works on the spot, but at the same time, I look down on you ......"

"I look down on your waste of improvisation, it's clear how strong a skill it is to improvise, but you use this skill to improvise a lot of mess, it doesn't make any sense, it sounds like a waste of time and disgusting works."

Speaking of this place, he turned his head to look at Fu Tuo and smiled apologetically: "I'm not talking about you, I'm talking about some people who have improvisation skills." ”

"I know ......"

Fu Tiao nodded, took two steps forward, walked behind Kapustin, and looked out of the house as well.

The group of people outside the room were still showing off their latest ideas for jazz, and all kinds of brilliant music were presenting here, some of which sounded very interesting, and some of which seemed mediocre.

Not everyone is a genius, even if this is already a jazz genius club, but in the club, there is also a genius among geniuses and a mediocre genius among geniuses.

And Kapustin is clearly talking about the mediocrity of those geniuses.

Kapustin took another sip of the Coke bottle in his hand, wiped his mouth with his cuff, and then turned his head to Fu and asked.

"You've finished reading my work just now?"

"It's almost there." Fu Tiao nodded honestly and said slowly: "The writing is very powerful, if I were asked to improvise, I feel that if I hadn't played very well that day and was inspired, I would not have been able to write such a work." ”

"Hahaha, inspirational, that's a good saying."

Kapustin smiled and patted Fu Tune's shoulder, and instead of returning to his place, he sat directly in front of the piano, his fingers falling directly.

A very interesting theme came out, and it was just a matter of listening to it.

This is Jazz.

He didn't look at Fu Tune, just played the piano and said slowly: "Fu, it's not that I just heard about you today, but I have heard about you before I came to Paris, and I didn't pay attention to it at that time, what made me really pay attention was that when I saw your information in the gramophone magazine before, I got to know you seriously for the first time." ”

"And the second time I knew about you was in the performance just now, when you were pulled by Hiromi to play on the stage, I really had some understanding of you at that time, and I knew what kind of person you were, a ...... A pianist like I thought of in my heart. ”

"If I had to use the right word to describe you, I would never use the word jazz pianist, because your music has a very classical temperament, and you are more of a classical pianist than a jazz pianist, even if you have a very interesting approach to jazz."

His body kept shaking as he played in his hands.

If it weren't for the fact that he had already thrown the score in front of Fu Tune, a classical score that was very complete and without any improvised elements in it, Fu Tune might have really thought that he was improvising.

After all, he said that he doesn't improvise at all, and that he plays everything he thinks about before he plays.

He said casually as he swayed.

"Your jazz has a very strong classical temperament, and it may feel a little old for other people, but I don't think that's the case at all, you have made a very interesting innovation in classical jazz, and this innovation is simply amazing, classical jazz is just a little bit of simple things that you can create like this."

"With the amazement comes ...... Greedy? Expect? Wish? I don't know what words to use to describe this, but I know exactly what I want......"

"Fu, I want you!"

As the last note fell, Kapustin turned his head to look at Fu Tune and said with a smile.

"Fu, this is not a joke, but seriously, I want you! I want you to interpret my work. ”

He turned around and continued to play his other pieces, speaking as he played.

"I've heard many, many people play my works, such as Lyudmir Angolov, such as Marc Andrei Hamelin, and some others, and recently I heard your Wang Jia from Huaguo also play my works, what do these people say......"

"There's a lot of classical stuff in their music, and even though they're all about showing off their skills, and a lot of their recordings are about showing off for the sake of showing off, and they know a little bit about jazz, there's hardly any feeling in their music that I want, including myself......"

He looked at his hand, and for some reason, his breath suddenly dropped a little.

"I'm not good at improvisation, so I always write down all my music and then play it, it sounds like improvisation, but after all, it's not the feeling of improvisation, I write very classical, and the root of my composition is jazz, there are a lot of contradictions, including my own recording, I am actually not particularly satisfied, I can only say that it is not bad, barely in line with my ideas."

"So, Fu, I have a request, if you can, if you have time, then I hope you can try to play my work, give me an answer that I am satisfied with, and in return, I will give you all my understanding of jazz."

He raised his head to look at Fu Tuo, and slowly asked, "Are you willing?" ”

“……”

Fu Tiao looked at the sheet music in his hand, felt the content on it, and didn't know how to answer for a while.

He thought for a long time, looked at the gray-haired man in front of him, and finally sighed and nodded slowly.

"I do."

[Note 1: This quote comes from Fanfare Magazine's interview with Kapustin in Issue 93-97, 2000]

(End of chapter)