DURING the first of his two headlining gigs in New York this summer Charlie Haden played bebop and ballads. He was leading Quartet West, a working band of more than 20 years, and playing a room where he had once appeared with Ornette Coleman.
At Mr. Hadens second recent engagement here, an outdoor show featuring his triplet daughters, his son and his wife, alongside an all-star coterie of Nashville musicians, he was the patriarch and keeper of the flame. It was a preview of Rambling Boy (Decca), Mr. Hadens warmhearted new album, which includes guest turns by Vince Gill, Rosanne Cash, Elvis Costello and Ricky Skaggs. And like the album, which is due out on Tuesday, it was deeply personal, drawing on Mr. Hadens lifetime in American music.
In particular Rambling Boy recalls his upbringing as the youngest member of the Haden Family, which was prominent on the Midwestern country circuit in the 1930s and 40s. Mr. Haden, then known as Cowboy Charlie, was a fixture on his familys daily radio shows from the time he was a yodeling toddler, before he lit out for the jazz life in Los Angeles, where he would later raise his own children.
People ask me how could I go from country to jazz. Its been a natural convergence for me. I wanted the whole family in this thing, because thats the way the Haden Family was.
--Charlie Haden
The new album, recorded in Nashville and consisting largely of traditional folk and country songs, explores that convergence with loving nostalgia. And as Mr. Haden approached the project in the spirit of a prodigal son returning home, he made a point of bridging generations along with genres.
Perhaps it was inevitable that he would produce a musical family himself. His son, Josh Haden, 40, is a singer-songwriter known for his indie-rock band, Spain. The Haden sisters, 37, are also singers, among other things. Petra, a violinist, and Rachel, a bassist and pianist, were founding members of That Dog, an alternative-rock group that had three albums on Geffen in the 1990s. Tanya, a cellist and visual artist, is married to the actor Jack Black, who makes a frisky cameo on the new album. (Well, this is a family affair, Mr. Haden recalls him saying. Im part of the family. I want to sing, too.)
