Solitons and Almost-Intertwining Matrices

We define the set of almost-intertwining matrices to be all triples(X,Y,Z) of n x n matrices for which XZ=YX+T for some rank one matrix T. A surprisingly simple formula is given for tau-functions of the KP hierarchy in terms of such triples. The tau-functions produced in this way include the soliton and vanishing rational solutions. The induced dynamics of the eigenvalues of the matrix X are considered, leading in special cases to the Ruijsenaars-Schneider particle system.