Jazz Articles about Pat Metheny

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Pat Metheny Group: The Way Up

by Doug Collette
January 25, 2005

Titled with his customary forward-thinking optimism, The Way Up is Pat Metheny's first project for Nonesuch Records. For all its intricacy, this ambitious group endeavor, a single extended composition in four parts, brings to mind the earliest, and comparatively simpler, works of the guitarist composer when he first established a four-piece band under his own name back in 1978.

The lyricism that has drawn and retained listeners for close to thirty years appears in abundance here, but there's also plenty ...

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The Way Up

by John Kelman
January 20, 2005

Like him or not, the one thing you cannot accuse guitar icon Pat Metheny of is complacency. Over the course of his thirty-year career he has tackled everything from the Midwestern folk sensibility of New Chautauqua to the free-spirited interplay of his collaboration with Ornette Coleman, Song X. But as significant and diverse as his solo efforts have been, the project that has been most near and dear to his heart has been Pat Metheny Group, now in its 27th ...

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The Pat Metheny Group: The Way Up

by AAJ Staff
January 18, 2005

From the opening sounds of traffic in Manhattan to the ascending coda, the Pat Metheny Group's The Way Up is a penetrating 68-minute statement about the search for meaning.

Pat Metheny has been a clear voice in jazz since the release of his classic treatise, Bright Size Life, produced when he was 22 years old. The spoken word of a young man in love with his life, it promised of yet untold eloquence. His brilliance has not remained ...

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Anna Maria Jopek and Friends with Pat Metheny: Upojenie

by Mark Sabbatini
June 22, 2004

How many Pat Metheny fans know “Tam. Gdzie Nie Siega Wzrok" is one of his most popular songs?

I'm willing to bet less than one fan in 1,000 recognizes the title, yet nearly any listener would immediately recognize it as one of most intriguing versions of “Follow Me" (from Imaginary Day ) he's performed.

That's the lure of Upojenie, an album recorded in Warsaw by the guitarist with a group of Polish musicians led by singer ...

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Pat Metheny / Kenny G: The Jazz Soul of P.D.Q. Bach

by Jack Bowers
April 1, 2004

In a move that has left the jazz world buzzing and their legions of fans traumatized in shock and disbelief, erstwhile polar opposites and outspoken adversaries Pat Metheny and Kenny G have recorded together for the first time, choosing as their common ground the singularly uncommon music of the opprobrious nineteenth/eighteenth century composer P.D.Q. Bach.At a media event held to trumpet the partnership (Pat’s brother, Mike, played lead trumpet) the former combatants were in a conciliatory mood. “It’s ...

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Pat Metheny: Rarum IX: Selected Recordings

by Norman Weinstein
March 9, 2004

ECM's Rarum series, where artists choose their own peak recordings, has resulted in an occasionally refreshing departure from a conventional “Greatest Hits" package. Yet this Metheny retrospective seems only minutely different from a “hits" package, though it is a vast improvement over Works, the label's previous anthology of popular Metheny.

Here is a 70 minute slice of Metheny primarily as jazz/pop synthesizer, with lots of pretty synth washes and power chords, with even a soupçon of crowd cheers ...

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Pat Metheny Trio at The Capitol Theatre in Cleveland

by C. Andrew Hovan
March 8, 2004

Pat Metheny Trio The Capitol Theatre Columbus, OH April 2000Much like a modern-day Ellington, guitarist and composer Pat Metheny has kept his working group together for many decades now and utilizes it as a workshop for developing his compositions, always tailoring his work, like the maestro, for the persons involved. Pushing the comparison further, Metheny also thrives on the many and various “sidebars" that he dabbles in from time to time. His latest trio project ...