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Michael Brecker: Timeline

By Scott Lichtman
February 21, 2025
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While the song "Timeline" is structured as a straightforward minor blues, it is nonetheless attention-grabbing and inspiring, for several reasons. First, Michael Brecker, Pat Metheny, Larry Goldings and Elvin Jones are the epitome of musicality, whether appreciated individually or as a unit. Then there is Metheny's composition: just when the listener becomes hooked on the catchy variations in the head, the band slides into a multi-bar, dotted-quarter, 11th chord progression in the chorus that lifts you out of 4/4 time and leaves you on another musical plane. Finally, there is Brecker's slow-burn solo, the kind that caused Metheny to refer to Brecker as an "assassin" for blowing away audiences and fellow musicians alike.

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Jazz/fusion keyboardist & autograph collector in Stamford CT.

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