A professional musician or pianist does more than just “play their instrument.”
If they’re truly great, they find ways to express themselves and show others what they feel—and in some cases, they simply show off their skills in front of others! For his part, Jacob Koller magnificently played the famous “Mission: Impossible” theme live at an airport in Japan.
Although it’s easily recognizable, Koller brought his own flare and technique to it.
If you are not familiar with public pianos or street pianos, they are pianos placed in a public place, encouraging passersby to play. Though there are countless videos showing this all over the internet, some of the more common ones take place in airports, train stations, public parks and so on.
The people at the airport were definitely caught off guard as Koller waltzed in, sat on piano bench and started playing. Their eyes and phones were glued to him right away!
Earlier he was just another person in the audience, but before long, he becomes the star.
When it comes to Tokyo street pianos, you can never tell the time when you might encounter an amazing player. As seen in the video, Koller was just standing behind the crowd and observing, looking at the passersby and playing the beautiful urban colored piano in the airport building.
After that, he set down his coat and got ready to play—and he was truly the Ethan Hunt of piano!
It starts with a long build-up bass progression with lots of improvised riffs. You can discern the identical parts of that piece from the original, and his dexterity and accuracy in playing with the notes are aesthetically wonderful.
The jazzy rendition of the piece offers more versatility, suspense and excitement as it progresses. At some point, it’s hard not to question whether he’s still playing the same piece or not.
The audience immediately takes out their smartphones and proceeds to take photos and videos of what they’re seeing in front of them. After all, it’s not every day you see talent like this!
Aside from just covering the song, Koller reinvents it with his own style.
What becomes clear by the end is Koller definitely makes the piece his own. He improvises plenty of new parts in his musical arrangement of it, and the theme proceeds from classic spy movie to an epic, boss battle theme song!
The people in the crowd didn’t know what just hit them! Just like a spy movie, a genius with an undetectable presence infiltrated and surprised them with an unexpected attack—and splendidly ended it with a breathtaking twist. As it turns out, the mission was not so impossible now for this pianist!
After watching this, now we know why he’s called “the mad arranger!”
Since it was loaded onto YouTube, plenty of people stressed that it was one of the best arrangements they’d ever seen of the song! For those who enjoyed this, Koller has two channels on YouTube—Jacob Koller/Mad Arranger and Jacob Koller Japan. If you’re a pianist trying to improve, or you just want to see someone with incredible skills, Koller is definitely worth checking out!
Congratulations to Jacob Koller on his awesome performance! Be sure to watch the whole thing in the link below:
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