Whoever thought of putting the American piano virtuoso Brad Mehldau in the Wigmore Hall for two nights deserves a raise. The second show was an unamplified concert for the trio that has now released seven successful acoustic jazz albums since 1996 - a spectacular tribute to the power of original music-making over modishness. The quietly remorseless Mehldau has made virtually no concessions to the ostensibly obligatory palliatives of electronics, fusion or smooth-jazz singers - but as the age range and enthusiasm of the audience showed, his communicative powers are immense and the unplugged sound in the room made them more so.
High among his gifts is the ability to apparently abandon the bar-breaks and chord-turns of the song structure while sustaining constant echoes of the tune. His long improvisations thus suggest extended forms more in common with classical music than with jazz's traditional miniaturism, while still cherishing melody, spontaneity and swing.
Grenada, the opening piece, was underpinned by a typical Mehldau prop, the quietly rocking two-chord mid-tempo vamp; bassist Larry Grenadier's countermelodies and Jorge Rossy's shimmery cymbal sound and occasional diversions into hand-drumming propelling it. Mehldau's second solo took the piece to another level of long-lined phrasing, double-time, and distance from the theme, another of his favourite variation styles.
The second half's All the Things You Are began with a right-hand improvisation instead of a theme, the song only hinted at by Mehldau's sporadic harrying at the bass notes. Radiohead's Everything In Its Right Place explored the trio's evocation of a kind of trancelike funk, More Than You Know and Lennon and McCartney's She's Leaving Home found Mehldau at his most unsentimentally romantic, with an encore on Spring Fever highlighting his minimalist, rhythm-based fondness for drumlike repeat notes and unpredictable use of space. Delicious.
· The London jazz festival, at various venues, ends tomorrow. Details: serious.org.uk. Brad Mehldau plays the CrawDaddy, Dublin, tomorrow. Box office: 00 353 1 478 0225. Then touring.
