Peter Sprague: Guinnevere

Peter Sprague, the San Diego-based guitarist who has gigged with everyone from Chick Corea to Hubert Laws, Charles McPherson to Dianne Reeves, seems to be accelerating his recording output of late. He is averaging more than two albums a year as leader the past half-decade, plus guest appearances on numerous others. And all of this is on top of his work running his own studio and small record label, SBE ("Striving to Break Even") plus a busy performance schedule.

His third full-length SBE release of 2026, Guinnevere, finds him splitting the difference between his Beatles tribute (All You Need Is Love: Peter Sprague Plays The Beatles) from early spring and the straight-ahead jazz of Anti AI, which came out over the summer.

On this outing, Sprague and his cohort switches seemingly effortlessly from rock covers to original post-bop jazz—although even when tackling Jimi Hendrix, the The Beach Boys or Crosby Stills & Nash, the arrangements and playing are fully immersed in a jazz environment. The guest vocalists Sprague employs also share his jazz sensibility.

But as with his recent tributes to The Beatles, Cream, and Carole King, Sprague retains an obvious affection for the rock and pop of his youth.

Hendrix's "The Wind Cries Mary" is performed at about the same pace as the original, perhaps a touch faster. It opens with Sprague playing the melody in unison with his brother Tripp Sprague on tenor sax. San Diego vocalist Lisa Hightower-Kibbe then takes the lead with a raspy half-spoken approach that calls to mind Hendrix's own unorthodox style. Lengthy solos by Tripp and Peter disassemble the theme with imaginative runs that find facets of the song Hendrix himself may not have imagined existed. The Brothers Sprague than re-establish the lead by doubling again, before Hightower takes the song's final few verses to the end.

"Good Vibrations" is anchored by singer Leonard Patton (just back in town after a summer tour in Pat Metheny's band), with Allison Adams Tucker providing a high-end vocal harmony. Drummer Duncan Moore and bassist Gunnar Biggs add a bit of a Caribbean lilt to the back end, while Peter's extended guitar solo in the middle is tasteful and restrained, maintaining a firm focus on Brian Wilson's exquisite melody.

The title track was first recorded by Crosby, Stills & Nash on their eponymous 1969 debut (Atlantic)—and the original arrangement was built around that group's distinctive three-part vocal harmonies. On this reading, Sprague's guitar shares the melodic lead with singer Rebecca Jade. The song is neither as well-known as the above two covers, nor is the melody as strong, giving the band perhaps a bit more freedom to change the arrangement around a bit. Jade's tone is crystalline, and Tripp's flute does a nice job of framing her vocals.

The final cover of a non-jazz song is "The Kiss" by the late Judee Sill, who never broke through to national acclaim but did tour opening for CS&N in the early 1970s. The opening passage is fairly loyal to Sill's own version, with Tucker having a similar tonality to Sill on vocals. Tripp plays acoustic piano, in another homage to Sill. Peter provides nice fills on guitar, with bassist Justin Grinnell and Moore lay down a relaxed, subdued foundation. And Peter's solo on acoustic guitar is achingly lovely.

"August," by Metheny's longtime keyboardist Lyle Mays, is performed here in a quintet setting with San Diego's John Opferkuch on piano, Biggs and Moore holding down the rhythm, and Mays' niece Aubrey Johnson vocalizing the melody, sharing the lead with Peter's guitar.

The album opens with a Sprague original, "George, Tell It Like It Is"—with the lyrics by Randy Phillips. Grinnell and Moore lay down a foundation that swings like crazy, with singer Sinne Eeg bouncing atop the quartet, her elegant vocal and Danny Green's piano evoking a late 1950s supper club vibe. Sprague's guitar solo on hollow-body also captures that same feeling—falling somewhere between Wes Montgomery and Kenny Burrell. Its melody, its structure, the arrangement—it all comes together to sound like a lost entry in the Great American Songbook.

Sprague and Phillips also combined forces to write "Whispers From the Great Beyond," featuring Peter playing all instruments (guitar, keys, drums, possibly more) and Jade on vocals. It is, according to the press release, Phillips' last love song to her recently departed husband. It is as much folk as jazz, but exactly where one tradition begins and the other ends is impossible to decipher: It is a seamless blending of two distinctively American styles, with Sprague's melody a timeless gem. The double-tracking of Jade's harmony vocals creates a richness that lends Phillips' touching lyrics even more emotional wallop.

The album closes out with one of Sprague's very first compositions, "You Make Me Want to Sing." The first iteration of this song was the title track on the 1978 LP by the Dance of the Universe Orchestra—a group of high school musicians in Del Mar dreaming of a life making jazz (Self Produced). (That band included not only the Sprague brothers, but singer Kevyn Lettau, bassist John Leftwich, and drummer Kelly Jocoy—all of whom have, indeed, gone onto successful careers as jazz musicians.) A year later, Sprague recorded an instrumental version for his debut as leader, Dance of the Universe—where the Xanadu label surrounded him with former Sarah Vaughan side men Mike Wofford (piano) and Bob Magnusson (bass), along with drummer Jim Plank .

Here, Tripp's daughter, Kate Sprague, handles the vocals, with her dad on flute and uncle on guitar. Opferkuch is back on piano, and Mackenzie Leighton is on bass here. Leighton and Moore (drums) create an Afro-Caribbean polyrhythm, while Kate and Tripp trade lead on vocals and flute. (And Kate's vocal delivery and tonality exhibit obvious influences from Lettau—a family friend of the Spragues since she and Tripp met in junior high school.) The arrangement is just a touch slower than on the 1978 version, and Kate's vocal range is a bit lower than Lettau's. But it is a lovely version all on its own, even accounting for the emotional impact of hearing a new take of the same song with two of the original performers nearly 50 years later.