Café Mouffe Presents: Bill Evans

I’m mesmerized by the motion of expressive hands on the keyboard. I see hands talking in vivid sign language the same way, peripherally. I don’t see the detail of finger positions, but the rhythm and sweep catches what’s left of my eye. So watch Bill Evans’ hands on this YouTube clip of My Foolish Heart. Watch how he bows over the piano as if in prayer.

A friend of mine saw Bill Evans at Gilly’s in Dayton in 1980. Between sets he found Evans hunched sadly over a cup of coffee in the White Tower across the street. “Every one digs Bill Evans,” my friend said by way of salutation. “Yeah?” Evans said with a shrug that waved off further conversation. Several months later Evans was dead, burned out from a life of heroin and cocaine.