This talk of pianists leads to talk of her recent CD, Marian McPartland and Willie Pickens/Ain't Misbehavin': Live at the Jazz Showcase. The disc was recorded during a series of performances done at Joe Segal's famed Chicago club during December 22-24, 2000. Of the nine tunes, McPartland and Pickens each perform two solos, leaving five duet tracks that are full of fresh and inventive improvisation and meld the very different styles of the two performers quite well. Pickens, who teaches jazz piano at Northern Illinois University, is well known in the Chicago area, having made many appearances at the Chicago Jazz Festival as well as teaching music in Chicago's public schools. He's worked with an incredible number of illustrious jazz musicians, including Elvin Jones, Clark Terry, Joe Henderson, Quincy Jones, Bunky Green, and Red Holloway. His style is exuberant, utilizing barrelhouse left-hand work as well as elements of stride piano that contrasts with McPartland's more classically influenced technique and melodic improvisations. I ask how she came to work with Pickens.

"…A couple of years ago I invited him to be a guest on Piano Jazz and we did a live Piano Jazz in Pittsburgh at a club there, and then later on we did a date at the Chicago Jazz Festival, playing duets…I just thought it might be fun to do my date at the Jazz Showcase with Willy instead of the trio, just for something different. So, then we thought, well, we might as well record it, and it came out pretty well, so that's actually how it happened. Oh, and then actually I played a concert with Willy out here, in San Francisco, so I began to think he would be a good piano partner for the record, and it turns out the record seems to be doing very well. It's funny, we don't really play the same way, but what we do seems to fit, it seems to have been a very successful get-together."

There is no doubt about the success of this venture, as one listen to the rollicking duet versions of "Ain't Misbehavin", "It Don't Mean A Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)", and "Just One of Those Things" make clear. This is a great disc for anyone who really loves jazz piano. The energy of the players, the song selection, the trading of musical ideas, and each musicians' support for the others' ideas ensures that this disc can be listened to again and again with increasing enjoyment.

Since we've talked so much about jazz piano duets, I can't help but ask McPartland if she has ever considered overdubbing in order to play duets with herself, as Bill Evans did on the illuminating Conversations With Myself. "No, I've never done that" she replies. "I don't know why, it's just…I suppose I could, but it's never really appealed to me that much. But I haven't thought about it for a long time, maybe I should think about that. But of course, Bill Evans was such a master at, you know, anything he did. If anybody could do that very well, he certainly could, and did. I don't know if I'd enjoy playing with myself. But maybe I'll try, you never know!"

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