Brad Mehldau at the Cleveland Museum of Art

Brad Mehldau Trio
Cleveland Museum of Art
Cleveland, OH
May, 13 2026

It had been exactly a decade since pianist Brad Mehldau last appeared on a concert stage in Northeast Ohio when he returned on a cold spring evening for his first performance at the Cleveland Museum of Art's Gartner Auditorium. Much had changed in the interim. Gone was the blustery trio featuring Larry Grenadier and Jeff Ballard, replaced instead by the more subdued pairing of bassist Felix Moseholm and drummer Jorge Rossy. Whether owing to the setting or to Mehldau's current artistic disposition, the overall mood remained restrained, the program divided almost evenly between originals in the first half and standards in the second.

Reaching back to his debut release, Introducing Brad Mehldau (Warner Bros., 1995), "Say Goodbye" opened the evening gently, its ruminative chords unfolding over a vamp that eventually gave way to a swinging release. This was followed by the waltz-time "Embers" from House on Hill (Nonesuch, 2006), an album long admired for its distinctive program of Mehldau originals. Moseholm was afforded ample solo space and proved himself an engaging storyteller, cleverly incorporating fragments of Mehldau's opening phrases into his own improvisation.

A frequent presence in Mehldau's live repertoire, "Generator" found the pianist consulting sheet music before navigating one of his characteristically angular structures. The eighth-note pulse supported another brooding melody while Rossy's drumming subtly pulled against the recurring phrases. Unfortunately, the drums were captured only by an overhead microphone and one on the bass drum, preventing many of Rossy's delicate textures from registering clearly—an issue compounded by his near-exclusive use of brushes throughout the set.

The final original of the evening, "Unrequited," spoke to the quasi-classical sensibility so prominent in Mehldau's writing; some have described him as a meeting point between Debussy and Bill Evans. Delivered as an undulating bossa nova, "I Concentrate on You" broadened the emotional palette considerably, pairing unusual single-note lines with dense chordal clusters and a more assertive rhythmic presence from Rossy. Sonny Rollins' "Airegin" supplied the evening's briskest tempo, with Mehldau generously ceding space to both Moseholm and Rossy.

Mehldau has clearly taken to heart the advice of Dexter Gordon and other jazz masters who insisted that a true understanding of standards begins with knowing their lyrics. His utterly delightful reading of the Richard Rodgers composition "Something Good" became a tour de force of melodic invention. A rendition of Nick Drake's 1969 song "River Man," recast in 5/4, proved an especially sagacious choice, yielding some of the evening's most sublime moments while helping secure an encore. Closing with the rarely heard Nat "King" Cole-associated gem "Annabelle," Mehldau reminded the audience of his wide-ranging gifts, even if one still found oneself wishing for a touch more muscle in the overall presentation.