The Bad Plus Farewell Tour at the Cleveland Museum of Art

The Bad Plus
Gartner Auditorium at the Cleveland Museum of Art
Cleveland, OH
October 7, 2026

After a 26-year run, The Bad Plus are calling it quits, going out with a series of musical fireworks. Having been on the road since the spring, the group still has more than 30 shows to go, with a four-night stand at Minneapolis' Dakota over the Christmas holiday marking the finale. Gabe Pollack, director of performing arts at the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA), first presented the group at the Bop Stop in 2018, when he was directing that venue. Following the departure of founding member Ethan Iverson and, subsequently, Orrin Evans about five years ago, the group has evolved into a quartet, adding guitarist Ben Monder and saxophonist Chris Speed to the core duo of bassist Reid Anderson and drummer Dave King.

Clocking in at approximately 80 minutes, the group's performance in Gartner Auditorium prominently featured five originals from its current album, Complex Emotions (Mack Avenue, 2024). "Casa Ben" opened with Anderson's eight-note bass riff, setting the stage for Speed's warm, romantic clarinet. Monder's statement was less about spinning out intricate bebop lines than unleashing a wash of sound, a defining aspect of his approach that underscores his status as a true innovator. A unison line shared by tenor saxophone and guitar then introduced the curiously titled "French Horns."

The 3/4 meter of "Carrier" put Speed out front on tenor, sparring animatedly with King's interactive rhythmic pulse. Gartner Auditorium can be a notoriously challenging room acoustically for drummers, but King displayed a keen sensitivity to the space, delivering what could best be described as quiet intensity. A mashup of John Coltrane's "Your Lady" and "Grid/Ocean" offered the kind of seamless exploration that has long been a hallmark of this talented group and proved to be one of the evening's highlights.

One of the most compelling aspects of The Bad Plus' original material is the way melody and rhythm are expressed outside conventional boundaries. King's "Sunwall" built its insistent melody around a repetitive 16th-note pattern, while "Anthem for the Earnest" opened with a drum solo before Monder once again employed persistent finger strumming to generate an entirely different sonic texture.

Following the band introductions, during which each member received a brief musical snippet of his own, the closing "Giant" began with a technically dazzling and beautiful bass solo from Anderson. The full quartet then joined in an extended exchange of musical banter that felt like a fitting sendoff for a group whose adventurous spirit has defined its work for more than a quarter-century. Bravo to the CMA for adding a Cleveland stop to this memorable farewell tour.