Dave Brubeck

Dave Brubeck didn't just change the way jazz sounded; he changed the way people listened to it. The bookish pianist became a bona-fide pop star when his revolutionary way of playing with space and time put the cool in cool jazz and pushed both his landmark album, Time Out, and its title track — a strangely hypnotic mix of snake-charmer sax riffs and off-kilter but oddly seamless-sounding 5/4 meter — to the upper reaches of the Pop charts. "Blue Rondo À la Turk" ups the ante even further, revealing Brubeck's classical background with its Mozart-inspired structure while weaving and bobbing around a strangely syncopated nine-beat rhythm. Brubeck's knack for wringing jazz from unusual sources extended to his hit album of Disney tunes, which made "Some Day My Prince Will Come" an overnight jazz standard later adopted by everyone from Bill Evans to Miles Davis.

In Next Steps, follow Brubeck across the sonic spectrum, from solo spotlight to beat-crazy blues.

Dave Brubeck's music was a magical mongrel beast, combining smoky-cool jazz, classically schooled concepts, and a pop-savvy gift for perfectly poised hooks. Jazz's original crossover king, he could cook up a conga-kissed summer breeze of an arrangement behind Tony Bennett on "That Old Black Magic" one moment, and mine a world's-loudest-whisper minimalist mode atop what sound like the first breakbeats in music history on "Watusi Drums." And when Brubeck leaves the band on the bus for a rare solo shot, he can work a kind of musical alchemy on a classic bluesy ballad like "Georgia On My Mind" that transmutes ivory and pine into sheer starry-eyed wonder.

In Deep Cuts, Brubeck's legendary quartet addresses the feet and the funny bone.

For all his pianistic prowess, Dave Brubeck's all about the band. In jazz, where ensembles come and go, his classic quartet with saxman Paul Desmond, drummer Joe Morello, and bassist Eugene "The Senator" Wright was an unusually long-lived team in which each musical personality contributed equally. Wright and Morello's interplay on a live version of "Three to Get Ready and Four to Go" shows off so much sparkling wit it even cracks up the audience. The infectious handclap-and-rim-shot rhythm energizing Brubeck's bluesy piano licks on "Unsquare Dance" makes you want to move your feet — until you realize you're trying to boogie to a 7/4 groove. Even in the '90s, working with an entirely different lineup, Brubeck never stopped searching out new challenges for his band, like trading licks with an orchestra and chorus on his own composition — hear the boundary-smashing results on "XIV. All My Hope."

A bespectacled guy who looked he could be somebody's accountant, Dave Brubeck was sort of the Elvis Costello of the cool-jazz era — the unlikely hero ushering in a bold, new sound and achieving mainstream stardom in the process. In Eisenhower America, he graced magazine covers and held a place of honor in college kids' record collections; his radical streak revolutionized jazz even as it won legions of new converts. And he has continued his journey through seven decades: Grand Old Man of jazz, hip-hop sample source, classical composer, Disney songbook interpreter . . . the many faces of Dave Brubeck come together here for a sonic snapshot in living color. So delve deep into the work of a musician who mastered time, and find out just what makes him tick.