Patrick Bruce "Pat" Metheny is an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
jazzJazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
guitaristA guitarist is a musician who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselves on the guitar while singing.- Versatility :The guitarist controls an extremely...
and
composerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
.
One of the most successful and critically acclaimed jazz musicians to come to prominence in the 1970s and '80s, he is the leader of the
Pat Metheny GroupThe Pat Metheny Group is a jazz group founded in 1977. The core members of the group are guitarist and bandleader Pat Metheny, composer, keyboardist and pianist Lyle Mays , and bassist and producer Steve Rodby...
and is also involved in duets, solo works and other side projects. His style incorporates elements of progressive and contemporary jazz, post-bop,
latin jazzLatin jazz is the general term given to jazz with Latin American rhythms.The three main categories of Latin Jazz are Brazilian, Cuban and Puerto Rican:# Brazilian Latin Jazz includes bossa nova...
and
jazz fusionJazz fusion is a musical fusion genre that developed from mixing funk and R&B rhythms and the amplification and electronic effects of rock, complex time signatures derived from non-Western music and extended, typically instrumental compositions with a jazz approach to lengthy group improvisations,...
. Pat Metheny has three gold albums and 18 Grammy Awards. He is the brother of jazz
flugelhornThe flugelhorn is a brass instrument resembling a trumpet but with a wider, conical bore. Some consider it to be a member of the saxhorn family developed by Adolphe Sax ; however, other historians assert that it derives from the valve bugle designed by Michael Saurle , Munich 1832 , thus...
ist and journalist
Mike MethenyMike Metheny is an American jazz flugelhornist and music journalist. He is perhaps best known as the brother of jazz guitarist and composer Pat Metheny. Metheny studied music education at the University of Missouri and Northeast Missouri State University, then played trumpet in the Army Field Band...
.
Biography
Metheny was born and raised in
Lee's SummitLee's Summit is a city in the U.S. state of Missouri, and is contained within the counties of Jackson and Cass. As of the 2010 census found the population at 91,364 making it the sixth-largest city in the Kansas City Metropolitan Area and the sixth-largest city in Missouri...
,
MissouriMissouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
, a suburb southeast of Kansas City. Following his graduation from Lee's Summit High School, he briefly attended the
University of MiamiThe University of Miami is a private, non-sectarian university founded in 1925 with its main campus in Coral Gables, Florida, a medical campus in Miami city proper at Civic Center, and an oceanographic research facility on Virginia Key., the university currently enrolls 15,629 students in 12...
in
Coral Gables, FloridaCoral Gables is a city in Miami-Dade County, Florida, southwest of Downtown Miami, in the United States. The city is home to the University of Miami....
in 1972, where he was quickly offered a teaching position. He then moved to
BostonBoston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
to take a
teaching assistantA teaching assistant is an individual who assists a professor or teacher with instructional responsibilities. TAs include graduate teaching assistants , who are graduate students; undergraduate teaching assistants , who are undergraduate students; secondary school TAs, who are either high school...
ship at the
Berklee College of MusicBerklee College of Music, located in Boston, Massachusetts, is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known primarily as a school for jazz, rock and popular music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including hip...
with jazz vibraphonist
Gary BurtonGary Burton is an American jazz vibraphonist.A true original on the vibraphone, Burton developed a pianistic style of four-mallet technique as an alternative to the usual two-mallets. This approach caused Burton to be heralded as an innovator and his sound and technique are widely imitated...
. He first made his name as a teenage prodigy under the wing of Burton.
In 1974 he made his recording debut on two sessions for pianist
Paul Bley'sPaul Bley, CM is a pianist known for his contributions to the free jazz movement of the 1960s as well as his innovations and influence on trio playing.-Biography:...
and Carol Goss'
Improvising Artists-Discography:...
label, along with fretless electric bassist
Jaco PastoriusJohn Francis Anthony Pastorius III , known as Jaco Pastorius, was an American jazz musician and composer widely acknowledged as a virtuoso electric bass player....
.
Metheny entered the wider jazz scene in 1975 when he joined Gary Burton's band, where he played alongside resident jazz guitarist
Mick GoodrickMick Goodrick is an American post bop jazz guitarist and educator most noteworthy for his work with vibraphonist Gary Burton's band from 1973 to 1976, where for part of that time he was playing alongside guitarist Pat Metheny...
. Goodrick was a 1967 alumnus of Berklee, who had held a teaching post there in the early 1970s. The two guitarists were interviewed jointly by Guitar Player Magazine in 1975, bringing them to the attention of fellow guitar aficionados around the world. Metheny's musical momentum carried him rapidly to the point that he had soon written enough material to record his debut album
Bright Size LifeBright Size Life is Pat Metheny's debut album, released in 1976, when Metheny was only 21. It is notable for the maturity of its compositions as well as the strength of Metheny's sidemen, as fellow fusion pioneer Jaco Pastorius was on bass along with drummer Bob Moses.-Track listing:-Personnel:*Pat...
with Pastorius and drummer Bob Moses.
Metheny's next recording, 1977's
WatercolorsWatercolors is Pat Metheny's second album, released in 1977.The Allmusic review by Richard S. Ginell awards the album 4 stars and states: "Metheny's softly focused, asymmetrical guitar style, with echoes of apparent influences as disparate as Jim Hall, George Benson, Jerry Garcia, and various...
, was the first to feature pianist
Lyle MaysLyle Mays is an American jazz pianist and composer from Wausaukee, Wisconsin. He is best known for his work with guitarist Pat Metheny as a member of the Pat Metheny Group...
, Metheny's most frequent collaborator. The other musicians on this session were
Eberhard WeberEberhard Weber is a German double bassist and composer. As a bass player, Weber is known for his highly distinctive tone and phrasing...
on upright bass and
Danny GottliebDanny Gottlieb is a freelance drummer who has performed as part of the Pat Metheny Group and Mahavishnu Orchestra. He is also a member of the University of North Florida jazz faculty, where he teaches as a fulltime Assistant Professor of Jazz Studies.- Biography :Danny graduated from the...
on drums. Metheny's next album formalized his partnership with Mays and began the Pat Metheny Group, featuring several songs they co-wrote; the album was released as the eponymous
Pat Metheny GroupPat Metheny Group is the first album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1978. It features Pat Metheny on guitar, Lyle Mays on piano and keyboards, Mark Egan on bass, and Dan Gottlieb on drums.-Track listing:-Personnel:...
on West German musician/producer
Manfred EicherManfred Eicher is a German record producer and the founder of ECM Records and its subsidiaries.Eicher studied music at the Academy of Music in Berlin. He is a record producer and a double-bass player. In 1969 he founded a record label in Munich called ECM - Edition of Contemporary Music...
's
ECMECM is a record label founded in Munich, Germany, in 1969 by Manfred Eicher. While ECM is best known for jazz music, the label has released a wide variety of recordings, and ECM's artists often refuse to acknowledge boundaries between genres...
record label. Pat Metheny also has released notable solo, trio, quartet and duet recordings with musicians such as
Jim HallJames Stanley Hall is an American jazz guitarist.-Biography:Educated at the Cleveland Institute of Music, Hall moved to Los Angeles where he began to attract national, and then international, attention in the late 1950s...
,
Dave HollandDave Holland is an English jazz double bassist, composer and bandleader who has been performing and recording for five decades. He has lived in the United States for 40 years....
,
Roy HaynesRoy Owen Haynes is an American jazz drummer and bandleader. Haynes is among the most recorded drummers in jazz, and in a career lasting more than 60 years has played in a wide range of styles ranging from swing and bebop to jazz fusion and avant-garde jazz...
,
Toninho HortaToninho Horta is a virtuoso electric and nylon-string guitar player; his music could be defined as Brazilian music.He has developed his own very personal style...
,
Gary BurtonGary Burton is an American jazz vibraphonist.A true original on the vibraphone, Burton developed a pianistic style of four-mallet technique as an alternative to the usual two-mallets. This approach caused Burton to be heralded as an innovator and his sound and technique are widely imitated...
,
Chick CoreaArmando Anthony "Chick" Corea is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, and composer.Many of his compositions are considered jazz standards. As a member of Miles Davis' band in the 1960s, he participated in the birth of the electric jazz fusion movement. In the 1970s he formed Return to Forever...
,
Pedro AznarPedro Aznar is an Argentine musician, with a lifetime of experience in jazz, Argentinian folk music, and rock and has had a successful career as a solo artist. He is very well known for giving rock songs a jazz-oriented style, by playing the fretless bass, with a big influence from Jaco Pastorius...
,
Jaco PastoriusJohn Francis Anthony Pastorius III , known as Jaco Pastorius, was an American jazz musician and composer widely acknowledged as a virtuoso electric bass player....
,
Charlie HadenCharles Edward Haden is an American jazz musician. He is a double bassist, probably best known for his long association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman...
,
John ScofieldJohn Scofield , often referred to as "Sco," is an American jazz guitarist and composer, who has played and collaborated with Miles Davis, Dave Liebman, Joe Henderson, Charles Mingus, Joey Defrancesco, Herbie Hancock, Pat Metheny, Bill Frisell, Pat Martino, Mavis Staples, Phil Lesh, Billy Cobham,...
,
Jack DeJohnetteJack DeJohnette is an American jazz drummer, pianist, and composer. He is one of the most influential jazz drummers of the 20th century, due to extensive work as leader and sideman for musicians like Miles Davis, Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, Keith Jarrett and Sonny...
,
Herbie HancockHerbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...
,
Bill StewartWilliam Harris "Bill" Stewart is an American jazz drummer. Stewart is a versatile player who has performed with a broad array of musicians, from Maceo Parker to Jim Hall...
,
Ornette ColemanOrnette Coleman is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s....
,
Brad MehldauBrad Mehldau is an American jazz pianist. Besides leading his own group, the Brad Mehldau Trio, he has performed with many renowned artists, including Pat Metheny, Wayne Shorter, Larry Grenadier, Peter Bernstein, Jeff Ballard, Joshua Redman, Christian McBride, Michael Brecker, Chris Potter, Kurt...
,
Joni MitchellJoni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
and many others.
Pat Metheny has also joined projects such as
Song XSong X is a free jazz album by Pat Metheny and Ornette Coleman. It was recorded in three days in December 1985 and released in March 1986...
with
Ornette ColemanOrnette Coleman is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s....
;
Parallel Realities; and
Jazz BalticaJazz Baltica is an intimate jazz festival held each summer in Schloss Salzau close to Kiel, Germany, and the coast of the Baltic Sea. It differs from most other festivals in its intimacy and the access that visitors have to the musicians...
, with
Ulf WakeniusUlf Wakenius is a Swedish jazz guitarist. Wakenius was a member of the Oscar Peterson quartet from 1997. He was also a member of the Ray Brown trio...
and other Nordic jazz players like
E.S.T.Esbjörn Svensson Trio was a Swedish jazz piano trio formed in 1993 consisting of Esbjörn Svensson , Dan Berglund and Magnus Öström . Its music has classical, rock, pop, and techno elements. It lists classical composer Béla Bartók and rock band Radiohead as influences...
, Nils Landgren and has played with female singers from all over the world, such as
Silje NergaardSilje Nergaard is a Norwegian pop and jazz musician.While some of her old titles have a distinct pop feel, she has now almost completely given up making pop music, and virtually the entirety of her later releases consists of jazz...
on
Tell Me Where You're Going (1990),
NoaAchinoam Nini , also known by her professional name, Noa, is a leading Israeli international concert and recording artist.-Career:...
on
Noa (1994),
Abbey LincolnAnna Marie Wooldridge , better known by her stage name Abbey Lincoln, was a jazz vocalist, songwriter, and actress. Lincoln was unusual in that she wrote and performed her own compositions, expanding the expectations of jazz audiences.-Biography:Born in Chicago, Illinois, she was one of many...
on
A Turtle's Dream (1994) and
Anna Maria JopekAnna Maria Jopek is a Polish musician and singer. She represented her country in the 1997 Eurovision Song Contest, with the song "Ale jestem" and finished 11th out of 25 participating acts; and in 2002, she collaborated on an album with jazz guitarist Pat Metheny...
on
Upojenie (2002).
Pat Metheny has been touring for more than 30 years, playing between 120-240 concerts a year.
Pat Metheny Group
The Pat Metheny Group is a fusion band founded in 1977. The first Pat Metheny Group release, 1978's
Pat Metheny GroupPat Metheny Group is the first album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1978. It features Pat Metheny on guitar, Lyle Mays on piano and keyboards, Mark Egan on bass, and Dan Gottlieb on drums.-Track listing:-Personnel:...
, featured the writing duo of Pat Metheny and pianist
Lyle MaysLyle Mays is an American jazz pianist and composer from Wausaukee, Wisconsin. He is best known for his work with guitarist Pat Metheny as a member of the Pat Metheny Group...
, a collaboration which has spanned over 25 years and 15 albums. The recording featured the electric bass playing of Jaco Pastorius's protégé
Mark EganMark Egan is an American jazz bass guitarist and trumpeter, arguably best known for his membership in the Pat Metheny Group from 1977 to 1980, and the Gil Evans Orchestra...
. The second group album,
American Garage-Track listing:-Personnel:* Pat Metheny - 6 & 12-String Guitar* Lyle Mays - Piano, Oberheim, Autoharp, Organ* Mark Egan - Bass* Dan Gottlieb - Drums-Charts:Album - Billboard-Trivia:...
(1980), was a breakout hit, reaching #1 on the Billboard Jazz chart and crossing over onto the pop charts as well, largely on the strength of the up-tempo opening track "(Cross the) Heartland" which would become a signature tune for the group. This early incarnation of the group included
Mark EganMark Egan is an American jazz bass guitarist and trumpeter, arguably best known for his membership in the Pat Metheny Group from 1977 to 1980, and the Gil Evans Orchestra...
on electric bass and Dan Gottlieb on drums.
The group built upon its success through constant touring across the USA and Europe. The early group featured a unique sound, particularly due to Metheny's
GibsonThe Gibson Guitar Corporation, formerly of Kalamazoo, Michigan and currently of Nashville, Tennessee, manufactures guitars and other instruments which sell under a variety of brand names...
ES-175The Gibson ES-175 is an electric guitar manufactured by the Gibson Guitar Corporation, currently still in production. It is a 24 3/4" scale full hollow body guitar with a trapeze tailpiece and Tune-O-Matic bridge...
guitar coupled to two
EventideEventide is an audio & broadcast, communications, and avionics company in the United States whose audio division manufactures digital audio processors and DSP software, and guitar effects...
Clockworks' Harmonizer
digital delayDelay is an audio effect which records an input signal to an audio storage medium, and then plays it back after a period of time. The delayed signal may either be played back multiple times, or played back into the recording again, to create the sound of a repeating, decaying echo.-Early delay...
units and Mays'
OberheimOberheim Electronics is an American company, founded in 1969 by Tom Oberheim , which manufactured audio synthesizers and a variety of other electronic musical instruments.-Oberheim Electronics:...
and
Sequential CircuitsSequential Circuits Inc. was a California-based synthesizer company that was founded in the early 1970s by Dave Smith and sold to Yamaha Corporation in 1987. The company, throughout its lifespan, pioneered many groundbreaking technologies and design principles that are often taken for granted in...
Prophet 5The Prophet-5 is an analog synthesizer that was manufactured by Sequential Circuits in San Jose, California between 1977 and 1984. The Prophet-5 was groundbreaking in that it was one of the first analog synthesizers to implement patch memory, a feature which stored user settings of every parameter...
synthesizers and
SteinwaySteinway & Sons, also known as Steinway , is an American and German manufacturer of handmade pianos, founded 1853 in Manhattan in New York City by German immigrant Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg...
piano. Even in this early state the band played in a wide range of styles from folk to rock to experimental. Metheny later started working with the
Rolandis a Japanese manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, electronic equipment and software. It was founded by Ikutaro Kakehashi in Osaka on April 18, 1972, with ¥33 million in capital. In 2005 Roland's headquarters relocated to Hamamatsu in Shizuoka Prefecture. Today it has factories in Japan,...
GR-300-External links:*...
guitar synthesizer and the
Synclavier guitar systemThe Synclavier System was an early digital synthesizer, polyphonic digital sampling system, and music workstation, manufactured by New England Digital Corporation, Norwich, VT. The original design and development of the Synclavier prototype occurred at Dartmouth College with the collaboration of...
made by
New England DigitalNew England Digital Corp. , founded originally in Norwich, Vermont and eventually relocated to White River Junction, Vermont, was best known for its signature product, the Synclavier Synthesizer System, which evolved into the Synclavier Digital Audio System or "Tapeless Studio." The company sold...
. Mays expanded his setup with the
SynclavierThe Synclavier System was an early digital synthesizer, polyphonic digital sampling system, and music workstation, manufactured by New England Digital Corporation, Norwich, VT. The original design and development of the Synclavier prototype occurred at Dartmouth College with the collaboration of...
keyboard and later with various other synthesizers.
From 1982 to 1985 the Pat Metheny Group released
OfframpOfframp is the Grammy Award winning third album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1982. The album won the Grammy Award for Best Jazz Fusion Performance in 1983.Offramp is the first studio recording on which Metheny used the guitar synthesizer....
(1982), a live set
TravelsTravels is the Pat Metheny Group's first live album, released in 1983. The album consists of two CDs worth of live material recorded at various venues including Philadelphia, Dallas, Sacramento and Hartford. Along with Pat Metheny, the album features Lyle Mays, Steve Rodby, Dan Gottlieb and the...
(1983), and
First CircleFirst Circle is a Grammy Award winning album by Pat Metheny Group released in 1984. On the album Pat Metheny is joined by Lyle Mays on piano and keyboards, Steve Rodby on bass, drummer Paul Wertico and vocalist and percussionist Pedro Aznar...
(1984), as well as
The Falcon and the SnowmanThe Falcon and the Snowman is an album of original music for the soundtrack of the Orion Pictures feature length film with the same title, composed and "co-produced" by both Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays....
(1985), a soundtrack album for the movie of the same name in which they collaborated with
David BowieDavid Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...
. A single from the soundtrack, '
This Is Not America"This Is Not America" is a song from the soundtrack for the film The Falcon and the Snowman.The track is the result of a collaboration between the jazz fusion Pat Metheny Group and rock singer David Bowie who provided the lyrics and vocals....
', reached number 14 in the British Top 40 in early 1985 as well as number 32 in the USA.
Offramp marked the first appearance of bassist
Steve RodbySteve Rodby is an American bassist.He joined the Pat Metheny Group in 1981. Prior to joining Metheny, he was a member of the Simon-Bard Group and the Fred Simon ensemble. Rodby continues to collaborate with Simon .Rodby studied bass at Northwestern University, a student of Warren Benfield of the...
(replacing Mark Egan) and Brazilian "guest artist"
Nana VasconcelosNaná Vasconcelos is a Brazilian Latin jazz percussionist, vocalist and berimbau player, most notable for his works with Pat Metheny, Don Cherry, Egberto Gismonti, and Gato Barbieri....
whose work on percussion and wordless vocals marked the first addition of Latin music shadings to the Group's sound, a trend which would continue and intensify on
First Circle with the addition of Argentinian multi-instrumentalist
Pedro AznarPedro Aznar is an Argentine musician, with a lifetime of experience in jazz, Argentinian folk music, and rock and has had a successful career as a solo artist. He is very well known for giving rock songs a jazz-oriented style, by playing the fretless bass, with a big influence from Jaco Pastorius...
, which also marked the group debut of drummer
Paul WerticoPaul Wertico is an American drummer. He gained recognition as a member of the Pat Metheny Group from 1983 until 2001, leaving the group to spend more time with his family and to pursue other musical interests. Metheny heard the Simon Bard Group with Wertico and bassist Steve Rodby, and invited...
(replacing Dan Gottlieb) - both Rodby and Wertico were members of the Fred Simon Group at the time, and had played in Simon-Bard as well, in Chicago, before joining Metheny.
This period became a peak of commercial popularity of the band, especially for the live recording
Travels.
First Circle would also be Metheny's last project with ECM Records; Metheny had been a key artist for ECM but left following conceptual disagreements with label founder Manfred Eicher. The next Pat Metheny Group releases would be based around a further intensification of the Brazilian rhythms first heard in the early 1980s. Additional Latin musicians appear as guests, notably Brazilian percussion player Armando Marçal.
Still Life (Talking)Still Life is an album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1987. This is the first group's album released by Geffen Records. It features fusion and crossover jazz, combining Brazilian jazz-influenced harmonies with jazz, folk, and pop elements...
(1987) was the Group's first release on new label
Geffen RecordsGeffen Records is an American record label, owned by Universal Music Group, and operated as one third of UMG's Interscope-Geffen-A&M label group.-Beginnings:...
, and featured several popular tracks, followed by
Letter from HomeLetter from Home is an album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1989 by Geffen Records. It picks up where Still Life leaves off, continuing to infuse Brazilian elements into light jazz.-Track listing:...
(1989) which also featured Aznar and Marçal. During this period The Steppenwolf Theater Company of Chicago featured an assortment of compositions by Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays for their production of Lyle Kessler's play
OrphansOrphans is a play by Lyle Kessler. It premiered in 1983 at the in Los Angeles starring Joe Pantoliano, Lane Smith and Paul Leiber, where it received critical and commercial success and won the Drama-Logue Award....
where it has remained special optional music for all productions of the play around the world since.
Metheny then again delved into adventurous solo and band projects, and four years went by before the release of the next record for the next Pat Metheny Group, a live set entitled
The Road to YouThe Road to You is the Pat Metheny Group's second live album, released in 1993, ten years after their first live release, Travels. All of the pieces were recorded live on a European tour in 1991. The songs where taken from the Bari, Pescara; Jesi and Naples, Italy; Marseilles, Paris; and Besançon,...
, which featured tracks from the two Geffen studio albums amongst new tunes. The group integrated new instrumentation and technologies into its work, notably Mays' unique playing technique accomplished by adding midi-controlled synth sounds at command during acoustic solos via a pedal on the piano.
Mays and Metheny themselves refer to the following three Pat Metheny Group releases as the triptych:
We Live HereWe Live Here is an album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 1995 by Geffen Records. This album shows a high level of collaboration between Lyle Mays and Pat Metheny having composed almost all the songs together except "Episode D'Azur"....
(1995),
QuartetQuartet is an album by the Pat Metheny Group.On Quartet Pat Metheny combines his guitar with bassist Steve Rodby, drummer Paul Wertico, and the writing abilities and keyboarding of Lyle Mays. The slow and relaxed sounds are largely improvisations, as the tracks were loosely written or completely...
(1996), and
Imaginary DayImaginary Day is an album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 1997 by Warner Bros. Records. It also won the 1999 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Jazz Album, while "The Roots of Coincidence" won Best Rock Instrumental Performance....
(1997). Moving away from the Latin style which had dominated the releases of the previous 10 years, these albums were the most wide-ranging and least commercial Group releases, including experimentations with sequenced synthetic drums on one track, free-form improvisation on acoustic instruments, and symphonic signatures, blues and sonata schemes.
After another hiatus, the Pat Metheny Group re-emerged in 2002 with the release
Speaking of NowSpeaking of Now is an album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 2002 by Warner Bros.-Track listing:# "As It Is" – 7:40# "Proof" – 10:13# "Another Life" – 7:08# "The Gathering Sky" – 9:22...
, another change in direction adding musicians to the band who are one generation younger and thus grew up with the Pat Metheny Group. The new members on the bandstand are the drummer
Antonio SanchezAntonio Sanchez may refer to:* Tony Sanchez, Texas businessman and former gubernatorial candidate* Tony Sanchez , baseball player* Antonio Sánchez , also known as "El Gangster"...
from Mexico City, trumpet player
Cuong Vuis a jazz trumpeter and vocalist.Born in Saigon, he left Vietnam with his family at the age of five in 1975, settling in Bellevue, Washington...
, and bassist, vocalist, guitarist, and percussionist
Richard BonaRichard Bona is a jazz bassist and musician. His real African name, as he said live in Montreal in a show with Bobby McFerrin, is Bona Pinder Yayumayalolo...
from
CameroonCameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon , is a country in west Central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west; Chad to the northeast; the Central African Republic to the east; and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of the Congo to the south. Cameroon's coastline lies on the...
.
The latest release, 2005's
The Way UpThe Way Up is the Grammy award winning thirteenth album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 2005. The album consists of one 68 minute-long piece, split into four tracks solely for CD navigation...
, is another large concept record which consists of one 68 minute-long piece (although split into four sections solely for CD navigation), a tightly organized, but not
through-composedThrough-composed music is relatively continuous, non-sectional, and/or non-repetitive. A song is said to be through-composed if it has different music for each stanza of the lyrics. This is in contrast to strophic form, in which each stanza is set to the same music...
piece based on a pair of three-note kernels: The opening B, A#, F# and the derived B, A, F#. The reception of
The Way Up was consistent, with standing ovations in each of the almost 90 concerts during the world tour 2005. On
The Way Up, harmonica player
Grégoire MaretGrégoire Maret was born in 1975 in Geneva, Switzerland. He began playing the harmonica at the age of 17. He graduated from high school in 1994....
from Switzerland was introduced as a new group member, while
Richard BonaRichard Bona is a jazz bassist and musician. His real African name, as he said live in Montreal in a show with Bobby McFerrin, is Bona Pinder Yayumayalolo...
contributed only as a guest musician.
During the world tour Brazilian
multi-instrumentalistA multi-instrumentalist is a musician who plays a number of different instruments.The Bachelor of Music degree usually requires a second instrument to be learned , but people who double on another instrument are not usually seen as multi-instrumentalists.-Classical music:Music written for Symphony...
Nando Lauria completed the line-up of the Pat Metheny Group.
The Way Up was released through
Nonesuch RecordsNonesuch Records is an American record label, owned by Warner Music Group and distributed by Warner Bros. Records.-Company history:Nonesuch was founded in 1964 by Jac Holzman to produce "fine records at the same price as a trade paperback", which would be half the price of a normal LP...
and all of Metheny's Geffen and Warner Brothers back catalogue is to be released on the label. Core members of the group are leader and founder, guitarist Pat Metheny,
Lyle MaysLyle Mays is an American jazz pianist and composer from Wausaukee, Wisconsin. He is best known for his work with guitarist Pat Metheny as a member of the Pat Metheny Group...
(piano, keyboards) and
Steve RodbySteve Rodby is an American bassist.He joined the Pat Metheny Group in 1981. Prior to joining Metheny, he was a member of the Simon-Bard Group and the Fred Simon ensemble. Rodby continues to collaborate with Simon .Rodby studied bass at Northwestern University, a student of Warren Benfield of the...
(double and electric bass) who joined in 1980. Drummer
Paul WerticoPaul Wertico is an American drummer. He gained recognition as a member of the Pat Metheny Group from 1983 until 2001, leaving the group to spend more time with his family and to pursue other musical interests. Metheny heard the Simon Bard Group with Wertico and bassist Steve Rodby, and invited...
replaced Dan Gottlieb in 1983 and continued to play with the group for more than 18 years, until he was replaced by Antonio Sanchez, currently also a member of The Pat Metheny Trio.
The current Pat Metheny Group members are Pat Metheny (guitars),
Lyle MaysLyle Mays is an American jazz pianist and composer from Wausaukee, Wisconsin. He is best known for his work with guitarist Pat Metheny as a member of the Pat Metheny Group...
(piano and keyboards),
Steve RodbySteve Rodby is an American bassist.He joined the Pat Metheny Group in 1981. Prior to joining Metheny, he was a member of the Simon-Bard Group and the Fred Simon ensemble. Rodby continues to collaborate with Simon .Rodby studied bass at Northwestern University, a student of Warren Benfield of the...
(double bass, electric bass), Antonio Sanchez (drums),
Cuong Vuis a jazz trumpeter and vocalist.Born in Saigon, he left Vietnam with his family at the age of five in 1975, settling in Bellevue, Washington...
(trumpet). Other musicians that have been hired regularly for Metheny Group tours are: the late
Mark LedfordMark Ledford was an American trumpet player, vocalist and guitarist.Ledford was most famous for his multi-instrumentalism, and from his membership in the Pat Metheny Group....
(vocals, trumpet, guitar);
David BlamiresDavid Blamires is a vocalist and composer and was born in Bradford, England but moved to Toronto, Canada and is one of Canada's most versatile and sought after session musicians...
(vocals, miscellaneous instruments); Armando Marçal (percussion);
Pedro AznarPedro Aznar is an Argentine musician, with a lifetime of experience in jazz, Argentinian folk music, and rock and has had a successful career as a solo artist. He is very well known for giving rock songs a jazz-oriented style, by playing the fretless bass, with a big influence from Jaco Pastorius...
(vocals, guitar, percussion);
Richard BonaRichard Bona is a jazz bassist and musician. His real African name, as he said live in Montreal in a show with Bobby McFerrin, is Bona Pinder Yayumayalolo...
(vocals, guitar, bass, and percussion). On the most recent tour to promote the record "The Way Up",
Grégoire MaretGrégoire Maret was born in 1975 in Geneva, Switzerland. He began playing the harmonica at the age of 17. He graduated from high school in 1994....
(harmonica, percussion, vocals) and Nando Lauria (guitar, percussion, vocals) joined the Group. Pat Metheny has collected 17 Grammy Awards, and of them, as part of The Pat Metheny Group, 10 of those awards were consecutive.
Side projects
When working outside of the confines of the PMG, Metheny has shown different sides to his musical personality. On
Secret StorySecret Story is an album by Pat Metheny released in 1992. The music is all composed by Metheny and it is one of his most ambitious and successful studio ventures, integrating elements of rock, jazz, neo-folk and "world music"...
(1992) and Orchestrion (2009), he has ventured into forms of orchestrating his music not covered by the PMG. Working with established jazz figures such as
Ornette ColemanOrnette Coleman is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s....
,
Chick CoreaArmando Anthony "Chick" Corea is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, and composer.Many of his compositions are considered jazz standards. As a member of Miles Davis' band in the 1960s, he participated in the birth of the electric jazz fusion movement. In the 1970s he formed Return to Forever...
,
Michael BreckerMichael Leonard Brecker was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Acknowledged as "a quiet, gentle musician widely regarded as the most influential tenor saxophonist since John Coltrane," he has been awarded 15 Grammy Awards as both performer and composer and was inducted into Down Beat Jazz...
,
Joshua RedmanJoshua Redman is an American jazz saxophonist and composer who records for Nonesuch Records. He won the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition in 1991.-Biography:...
,
Charlie HadenCharles Edward Haden is an American jazz musician. He is a double bassist, probably best known for his long association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman...
,
Jim HallJames Stanley Hall is an American jazz guitarist.-Biography:Educated at the Cleveland Institute of Music, Hall moved to Los Angeles where he began to attract national, and then international, attention in the late 1950s...
,
Dave HollandDave Holland is an English jazz double bassist, composer and bandleader who has been performing and recording for five decades. He has lived in the United States for 40 years....
,
Christian McBrideChristian McBride is an American jazz bassist. His father, Lee Smith, and his great uncle, Howard Cooper, are well known Philadelphia bassists who served as McBride's early mentors...
, David Sanchez and
Roy HaynesRoy Owen Haynes is an American jazz drummer and bandleader. Haynes is among the most recorded drummers in jazz, and in a career lasting more than 60 years has played in a wide range of styles ranging from swing and bebop to jazz fusion and avant-garde jazz...
, he has made records that have found favor with jazz critics who were disparaging of the "pastoral" or "light rock" aspects of his work with the PMG. Projects like the collaboration with Derek Bailey and
Zero Tolerance for SilenceZero Tolerance for Silence is a controversial 1994 album by American jazz guitarist Pat Metheny.Recorded for Geffen Records, it was performed entirely on guitar, although all of the tracks were overdubbed...
have confounded critics who saw Metheny as following a path of increasing blandness with the PMG. Metheny's latest side projects teams him with
Brad MehldauBrad Mehldau is an American jazz pianist. Besides leading his own group, the Brad Mehldau Trio, he has performed with many renowned artists, including Pat Metheny, Wayne Shorter, Larry Grenadier, Peter Bernstein, Jeff Ballard, Joshua Redman, Christian McBride, Michael Brecker, Chris Potter, Kurt...
and his Trio. In 2006, Metheny appeared as a sideman on Brecker's last album,
PilgrimagePilgrimage is the final studio album, released in 2007, by the late American jazz saxophonist Michael Brecker. In 2005, Brecker was diagnosed with myelogenous leukemia, and at the time of the recording, he was already gravely ill...
.
Guitar contributions
Continuing the tradition of jazz guitarists borrowing tones and techniques from their rock counterparts, Metheny has made alterations to the jazz guitar tone palette.
Twelve-string electric
Prior to Metheny,
Pat MartinoPat Martino is an Italian-American jazz guitarist and composer within the post bop, fusion, mainstream jazz, soul jazz and hard bop idioms.-Biography:...
had used the electric twelve-string guitar on a studio album,
Desperado, and
John McLaughlinJohn McLaughlin , also known as Mahavishnu John McLaughlin, is an English guitarist, bandleader and composer...
had used a double-neck electric guitar with the Mahavishnu Orchestra. (
Lenny BreauLeonard Harold "Lenny" Breau was a musician, guitar player, and music educator. He was known for blending many styles of music including: jazz, country, classical and flamenco guitar...
had introduced the acoustic twelve-string to jazz. ) Metheny introduced alternate 12-string tunings to jazz; these can be heard on tunes such as "Sirabhorn" (from
Bright Size Life) and San Lorenzo (from
Pat Metheny Group and
Travels).
Six-string electric
Metheny's tone, which has evolved over the years, involves using the natural full-frequency response of his hollow-body guitar, combined with high-midrange settings on his amplifier to create a smooth, sustaining lead sound that is virtually devoid of piercing treble yet is able to cut through a dense mix. By using
digital signal processingDigital signal processing is concerned with the representation of discrete time signals by a sequence of numbers or symbols and the processing of these signals. Digital signal processing and analog signal processing are subfields of signal processing...
that involves digital delay/chorus and reverb, he has created a big, rich, and resonant instrumental voice.
Guitar synthesizer
Metheny was also one of the first jazz guitarists to make heavy use of the
Rolandis a Japanese manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, electronic equipment and software. It was founded by Ikutaro Kakehashi in Osaka on April 18, 1972, with ¥33 million in capital. In 2005 Roland's headquarters relocated to Hamamatsu in Shizuoka Prefecture. Today it has factories in Japan,...
GR-300
Guitar SynthesizerA guitar synthesizer is any one of a number of musical instrument systems that allow a guitar player to play synthesizer sound. While the term "MIDI guitar" is often used as a synonym for the field of guitar/synthesis or for a guitar/synthesizer, MIDI is not always used...
. While John Abercrombie and
Bill FrisellWilliam Richard "Bill" Frisell is an American guitarist and composer.One of the leading guitarists in jazz since the late 1980s, Frisell's eclectic music touches on progressive folk, classical music, country music, noise and more...
also used it heavily in the 1980s, Metheny is the only one of the three who still uses the instrument on a regular basis. Unlike many guitar synth users, Metheny limits himself to a very small number of sounds. In interviews, he has argued that each of the timbres achievable through guitar synthesis should be treated as a separate instrument, and that he has tried to master each of these "instruments" instead of using it for incidental color. One of the "patches" that Pat used often is on Roland's JV-80 "Vintage Synth" expansion card titled "Pat's GR-300".
42-string Pikasso guitar
Metheny plays a
custom-madeAn experimental musical instrument is a musical instrument that modifies or extends an existing instrument or class of instruments, or defines or creates a new class of instrument. Some are created through simple modifications, such as cracked drum cymbals or metal objects inserted between piano...
Pikasso IThe Pikasso Guitar, or Pikasso I, is a custom made harp guitar created by Canadian luthier Linda Manzer.Its name is ostensibly derived from its likeness in appearance to the cubist works of Pablo Picasso.-Players:...
created by Canadian
luthierA luthier is someone who makes or repairs lutes and other string instruments. In the United States, the term is used interchangeably with a term for the specialty of each maker, such as violinmaker, guitar maker, lute maker, etc...
Linda ManzerLinda Manzer is a Canadian master luthier renowned for her archtop, flat-top and harp acoustic guitars.She received her training from Jean Larrivée between 1974 and 1978 and later studied with the late Jimmy D'Aquisto in New York....
on "Into the Dream" and on the albums
Quartet,
Imaginary Day,
Jim Hall & Pat Metheny,
Trio->Live, and the
Speaking of Now Live and
Imaginary Day DVDs. Metheny has also used the guitar in his guest appearances on other artist's albums.
Manzer has also made many acoustic guitars for Metheny, including a mini guitar, an acoustic sitar guitar, and also the
baritone guitarThe baritone guitar is a variation on the standard guitar, with a longer scale length that allows it to be tuned to a lower range. It first appeared in the classical music realm...
, which Metheny used for the recording of
One Quiet Night. His latest use of the Pikasso is found on the album
Metheny Mehldau QuartetMetheny/Mehldau Quartet is a jazz album released in 2007 by Nonesuch Records, and is a collaboration album between guitarist/composer Pat Metheny, and jazz pianist Brad Mehldau. The first disc, Metheny/Mehldau, was released in 2006, and contains mostly duet recordings with the exception of two...
, his second collaboration with pianist
Brad MehldauBrad Mehldau is an American jazz pianist. Besides leading his own group, the Brad Mehldau Trio, he has performed with many renowned artists, including Pat Metheny, Wayne Shorter, Larry Grenadier, Peter Bernstein, Jeff Ballard, Joshua Redman, Christian McBride, Michael Brecker, Chris Potter, Kurt...
and his trio sidemen
Larry GrenadierLarry Grenadier is an American jazz double bassist.His father, Albert, was a trumpet player, and his two brothers, Phil and Steve, would eventually play trumpet and guitar respectively. Grenadier too began on trumpet when he was 10 years old. His father taught him to read music and gave him his...
and
Jeff BallardJeffrey Scott Ballard is a former Major League Baseball pitcher, playing from to .Following his career, Ballard returned to his hometown of Billings, where he has become an instrumental part of local American Legion Baseball programs...
; the Pikasso is featured in Metheny's impressionistic composition "The Sound of Water."
Influences
As a young musician, Pat Metheny did everything he could to sound like
Wes MontgomeryJohn Leslie "Wes" Montgomery was an American jazz guitarist. He is widely considered one of the major jazz guitarists, emerging after such seminal figures as Django Reinhardt and Charlie Christian and influencing countless others, including Pat Martino, George Benson, Russell Malone, Emily...
, but when he was 14 or 15, he decided that he felt that it was disrespectful to imitate him. In the liner notes on the 2-disc Montgomery compilation
Impressions: the Verve Jazz Sides, Metheny is quoted as saying, "(Smokin' at the Half Note) is the absolute greatest jazz-guitar album ever made. It is also the record that taught me how to play."
The angular compositions, asymmetrical lines, relentless rhythmic drive, and deep blues feeling of
Ornette ColemanOrnette Coleman is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s....
's
New York is Now (Blue Note) inspired Metheny to find his own direction. He has recorded Coleman compositions on a number of his records (starting with a medley of "Round Trip" and "Broadway Blues" on his debut
Bright Size Life); worked extensively with Coleman collaborators such as
Charlie HadenCharles Edward Haden is an American jazz musician. He is a double bassist, probably best known for his long association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman...
,
Dewey RedmanDewey Redman was an American jazz saxophonist, known for performing free jazz as a bandleader, and with Ornette Coleman and Keith Jarrett....
, and
Billy HigginsBilly Higgins was an American jazz drummer. He played mainly free jazz and hard bop.Higgins was born in Los Angeles, California. Higgins played on Ornette Coleman's first records, beginning in 1958...
; and has even made a record,
Song XSong X is a free jazz album by Pat Metheny and Ornette Coleman. It was recorded in three days in December 1985 and released in March 1986...
, with Coleman.
Metheny's playing (as well as his tone) also show significant influence by Jim Hall,
Joe DiorioJoseph Louis Diorio is an American jazz guitarist. He has performed with legends of jazz like Sonny Stitt, Eddie Harris, Ira Sullivan, Stan Getz, Pat Metheny, Horace Silver, and Freddie Hubbard...
,
Kenny BurrellKenneth Earl "Kenny" Burrell is an American jazz guitarist. His playing is grounded in bebop and blues; he has performed and recorded with a wide range of jazz musicians.-Biography:...
,
Joe PassJoe Pass was an Italian-American jazz guitarist of Sicilian descent. He is generally considered to be one of the greatest jazz guitarists of the 20th century...
, and other classic jazz players. Metheny has often been quoted saying that he is as likely to name non-guitarists as significant stylistic influences as fellow guitar players, giving as examples players like Clifford Brown and John Coltrane. He has stated that Miles Davis' live album Four & More was hugely influential on his pursuit into jazz music. He has also admitted to being heavily influenced by
The BeatlesThe Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
, going so far as to say that everything by The Beatles has impacted him as a musician. He has paid significant attention to the evolution of guitar playing across genres, however, and is familiar with the playing of notables from the likes of rocker
Eddie Van HalenEdward Lodewijk "Eddie" Van Halen is a Dutch-American guitarist, keyboardist, songwriter and producer, best known as the lead guitarist and co-founder of the hard rock band Van Halen, inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame...
to
Leo KottkeLeo Kottke is an acoustic guitarist. He is widely known for his innovative fingerpicking style, which draws on influences from blues, jazz, and folk music, and his syncopated, polyphonic melodies...
.
In particular, he has been influenced by Brazilian music--both the European-influenced jazz sound of the
bossa novaBossa nova is a style of Brazilian music. Bossa nova acquired a large following in the 1960s, initially consisting of young musicians and college students...
and the intensely polyrhythmic Afro-Brazilian sounds of the country's northeast. Metheny made 3 albums on ECM with the Brazilian vocalist and percussionist
Naná VasconcelosNaná Vasconcelos is a Brazilian Latin jazz percussionist, vocalist and berimbau player, most notable for his works with Pat Metheny, Don Cherry, Egberto Gismonti, and Gato Barbieri....
in the early 1980s. He also lived in Brazil from the late 1980s to the early 1990s and performed with several local musicians such as
Milton Nascimento-Biography:Nascimento's mother was the maid Maria Nascimento. As a baby, Milton Nascimento was adopted by his mother's former employers: the couple Josino Brito Campos, a banker employee, mathematics teacher and electronic technician; and Lília Silva Campos, a music teacher and choir singer...
and
Toninho HortaToninho Horta is a virtuoso electric and nylon-string guitar player; his music could be defined as Brazilian music.He has developed his own very personal style...
. He also played with
Antonio Carlos JobimAntônio Carlos Brasileiro de Almeida Jobim , also known as Tom Jobim , was a Brazilian songwriter, composer, arranger, singer, and pianist/guitarist. He was a primary force behind the creation of the bossa nova style, and his songs have been performed by many singers and instrumentalists within...
as a tribute, in a live performance in Carnegie Hall Salutes The Jazz Masters: Verve 50th Anniversary before Jobim’s passing away.
He is also a fan of several pop music artists, especially singer/songwriters including The Beatles;
James TaylorJames Vernon Taylor is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A five-time Grammy Award winner, Taylor was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2000....
(after whom he named the song "James" on
Offramp);
Bruce HornsbyBruce Randall Hornsby is an American singer, pianist, accordion player, and songwriter. Known for the spontaneity and creativity of his live performances, Hornsby draws frequently from classical, jazz, bluegrass, folk, Motown, rock, blues, and jam band musical traditions with his songwriting and...
,
Cheap TrickCheap Trick is an American rock band from Rockford, Illinois, formed in 1973. The band consists of members Robin Zander , Rick Nielsen , Tom Petersson , and Bun E...
,
Joni MitchellJoni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
, with whom he performed on her Shadows and Light (1980, Asylum/ Elektra) live tour. Metheny is also fond of
BucketheadBrian Carroll , better known by his stage name Buckethead, is a guitarist and multi instrumentalist who has worked within several genres of music. He has released 34 studio albums, four special releases and one EP. He has performed on over 50 more albums by other artists...
's music. He also worked with, sponsored or helped to make attractive recordings of unique singer/songwriters from all over the world such as
Pedro AznarPedro Aznar is an Argentine musician, with a lifetime of experience in jazz, Argentinian folk music, and rock and has had a successful career as a solo artist. He is very well known for giving rock songs a jazz-oriented style, by playing the fretless bass, with a big influence from Jaco Pastorius...
(Argentina),
David BowieDavid Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...
(UK),
Silje NergaardSilje Nergaard is a Norwegian pop and jazz musician.While some of her old titles have a distinct pop feel, she has now almost completely given up making pop music, and virtually the entirety of her later releases consists of jazz...
(Norway),
NoaAchinoam Nini , also known by her professional name, Noa, is a leading Israeli international concert and recording artist.-Career:...
(Israel), and
Anna Maria JopekAnna Maria Jopek is a Polish musician and singer. She represented her country in the 1997 Eurovision Song Contest, with the song "Ale jestem" and finished 11th out of 25 participating acts; and in 2002, she collaborated on an album with jazz guitarist Pat Metheny...
(Poland).
Two of Metheny's recordings,
The Way UpThe Way Up is the Grammy award winning thirteenth album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 2005. The album consists of one 68 minute-long piece, split into four tracks solely for CD navigation...
and
OrchestrionAn orchestrion is a generic name for a machine that plays music and is designed to sound like an orchestra or band. Orchestrions may be operated by means of a large pinned cylinder or by a music roll and less commonly book music. The sound is usually produced by pipes, though they will be voiced...
, evidence the influence of American minimalist composer
Steve ReichStephen Michael "Steve" Reich is an American composer who together with La Monte Young, Terry Riley, and Philip Glass is a pioneering composer of minimal music...
and utilize similar rhythmic figures structured around pulse. Reich's composition
Electric CounterpointElectric Counterpoint is a minimalist composition written by American composer Steve Reich. The piece consists of three movements, "Fast", "Slow", and "Fast"...
was first recorded by Metheny and appears on the
Different TrainsDifferent Trains is a three-movement piece for string quartet and tape written by Steve Reich in 1988. It won a Grammy Award in 1990 for Best Contemporary Classical Composition.The work's three movements have the following titles:...
CD released by
Nonesuch RecordsNonesuch Records is an American record label, owned by Warner Music Group and distributed by Warner Bros. Records.-Company history:Nonesuch was founded in 1964 by Jac Holzman to produce "fine records at the same price as a trade paperback", which would be half the price of a normal LP...
in 1987.
The Metheny Brothers
Pat took part in recording some of the CDs by his older brother, trumpeter
Mike MethenyMike Metheny is an American jazz flugelhornist and music journalist. He is perhaps best known as the brother of jazz guitarist and composer Pat Metheny. Metheny studied music education at the University of Missouri and Northeast Missouri State University, then played trumpet in the Army Field Band...
, a talented jazz musician and a trumpet player based in Kansas City, Missouri, among them
Day In - Night Out (1986) and more recently
Close Enough for Love (2001).
Early recognition
Chuck LorreChuck Lorre is a writer, director, producer and composer who has created many American sitcoms, including Grace Under Fire, Cybill, Dharma & Greg, Two and a Half Men and The Big Bang Theory...
(producer of
Two and a Half MenTwo and a Half Men is an American television sitcom that premiered on CBS on September 22, 2003. Starring Charlie Sheen, Jon Cryer, and Angus T. Jones, the show was originally about a hedonistic jingle writer, Charlie Harper; his uptight brother, Alan; and Alan's growing son, Jake...
and
The Big Bang TheoryThe Big Bang Theory is an American sitcom created by Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, both of whom serve as executive producers on the show, along with Steven Molaro. All three also serve as head writers...
) mentions Pat Metheny in his weekly 'vanity card' (shown briefly after the credits of the Season 1 Episode 12 episode of
The Big Bang TheoryThe Big Bang Theory is an American sitcom created by Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, both of whom serve as executive producers on the show, along with Steven Molaro. All three also serve as head writers...
entitled "The Jerusalem Duality"). To summarize, Chuck Lorre was a professional guitarist at the age of 22. He was invited to audit a jazz guitar class at the
University of MiamiThe University of Miami is a private, non-sectarian university founded in 1925 with its main campus in Coral Gables, Florida, a medical campus in Miami city proper at Civic Center, and an oceanographic research facility on Virginia Key., the university currently enrolls 15,629 students in 12...
, and his ego was crushed when Pat Metheny began to play. Chuck says that this experience played a part in shifting his focus toward television.
Awards
In 1995, Pat Metheny was granted the Miles Davis Award by the Montreal International Jazz Festival.
List of Grammy Awards received by Pat Metheny
| Year |
Category |
Title |
Note |
| 2008 |
Best Jazz Instrumental Album |
Pilgrimage Pilgrimage is the final studio album, released in 2007, by the late American jazz saxophonist Michael Brecker. In 2005, Brecker was diagnosed with myelogenous leukemia, and at the time of the recording, he was already gravely ill...
|
Won as a Producer |
| 2006 |
Best Contemporary Jazz Album |
The Way Up The Way Up is the Grammy award winning thirteenth album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 2005. The album consists of one 68 minute-long piece, split into four tracks solely for CD navigation...
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 2004 |
Best New Age Album |
One Quiet Night One Quiet Night is a solo album by Pat Metheny, released in 2003. The album was recorded in one night and provides a raw sample of Metheny's skill on acoustic and baritone guitars. It features interpretations of Norah Jones' hit "Don't Know Why" and Gerry & The Pacemakers's "Ferry Cross the...
|
|
| 2003 |
Best Contemporary Jazz Album |
Speaking of Now Speaking of Now is an album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 2002 by Warner Bros.-Track listing:# "As It Is" – 7:40# "Proof" – 10:13# "Another Life" – 7:08# "The Gathering Sky" – 9:22...
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 2001 |
Best Jazz Instrumental Solo |
"(Go) Get It" -Personnel:*Pat Metheny: Acoustic guitar*Larry Grenadier: Upright bass*Bill Stewart: Drum kit...
|
Won as a Soloist |
| 2000 |
Best Jazz Instrumental Performance |
Like Minds |
with Chick CoreaArmando Anthony "Chick" Corea is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, and composer.Many of his compositions are considered jazz standards. As a member of Miles Davis' band in the 1960s, he participated in the birth of the electric jazz fusion movement. In the 1970s he formed Return to Forever...
, Dave HollandDave Holland is an English jazz double bassist, composer and bandleader who has been performing and recording for five decades. He has lived in the United States for 40 years....
, Gary BurtonGary Burton is an American jazz vibraphonist.A true original on the vibraphone, Burton developed a pianistic style of four-mallet technique as an alternative to the usual two-mallets. This approach caused Burton to be heralded as an innovator and his sound and technique are widely imitated...
, Roy HaynesRoy Owen Haynes is an American jazz drummer and bandleader. Haynes is among the most recorded drummers in jazz, and in a career lasting more than 60 years has played in a wide range of styles ranging from swing and bebop to jazz fusion and avant-garde jazz...
|
| 1999 |
Best Rock Instrumental Performance |
"The Roots of Coincidence" Imaginary Day is an album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 1997 by Warner Bros. Records. It also won the 1999 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Jazz Album, while "The Roots of Coincidence" won Best Rock Instrumental Performance....
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 1999 |
Best Contemporary Jazz Performance |
Imaginary Day Imaginary Day is an album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 1997 by Warner Bros. Records. It also won the 1999 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Jazz Album, while "The Roots of Coincidence" won Best Rock Instrumental Performance....
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 1998 |
Best Jazz Instrumental Performance |
Beyond the Missouri Sky (Short Stories) Beyond the Missouri Sky is a jazz album by Charlie Haden and Pat Metheny, both Missourian.The album was released by Verve Records on February 25, 1997....
|
with Charlie HadenCharles Edward Haden is an American jazz musician. He is a double bassist, probably best known for his long association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman...
|
| 1996 |
Best Contemporary Jazz Performance |
We Live Here We Live Here is an album by the Pat Metheny Group, released in 1995 by Geffen Records. This album shows a high level of collaboration between Lyle Mays and Pat Metheny having composed almost all the songs together except "Episode D'Azur"....
|
Pat Metheny Goup |
| 1994 |
Best Contemporary Jazz Performance |
The Road to You The Road to You is the Pat Metheny Group's second live album, released in 1993, ten years after their first live release, Travels. All of the pieces were recorded live on a European tour in 1991. The songs where taken from the Bari, Pescara; Jesi and Naples, Italy; Marseilles, Paris; and Besançon,...
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 1993 |
Best Contemporary Jazz Performance |
Secret Story Secret Story is an album by Pat Metheny released in 1992. The music is all composed by Metheny and it is one of his most ambitious and successful studio ventures, integrating elements of rock, jazz, neo-folk and "world music"...
|
|
| 1991 |
Best Instrumental Composition |
"Change of Heart" Question and Answer is a 1989 music album release by modern jazz artists Pat Metheny, Dave Holland, Roy Haynes.-Track listing:# "Solar" – 8:27# "Question and Answer" – 7:07# "H&H" – 6:51...
|
Won as a Composer |
| 1990 |
Best Jazz Fusion Performance |
Letter from Home Letter from Home is an album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1989 by Geffen Records. It picks up where Still Life leaves off, continuing to infuse Brazilian elements into light jazz.-Track listing:...
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 1988 |
Best Jazz Fusion Performance |
Still Life (Talking) Still Life is an album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1987. This is the first group's album released by Geffen Records. It features fusion and crossover jazz, combining Brazilian jazz-influenced harmonies with jazz, folk, and pop elements...
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 1985 |
Best Jazz Fusion Performance |
First Circle First Circle is a Grammy Award winning album by Pat Metheny Group released in 1984. On the album Pat Metheny is joined by Lyle Mays on piano and keyboards, Steve Rodby on bass, drummer Paul Wertico and vocalist and percussionist Pedro Aznar...
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 1984 |
Best Jazz Fusion Performance |
Travels Travels is the Pat Metheny Group's first live album, released in 1983. The album consists of two CDs worth of live material recorded at various venues including Philadelphia, Dallas, Sacramento and Hartford. Along with Pat Metheny, the album features Lyle Mays, Steve Rodby, Dan Gottlieb and the...
|
Pat Metheny Group |
| 1983 |
Best Jazz Fusion Performance |
Offramp Offramp is the Grammy Award winning third album by Pat Metheny Group, released in 1982. The album won the Grammy Award for Best Jazz Fusion Performance in 1983.Offramp is the first studio recording on which Metheny used the guitar synthesizer....
|
Pat Metheny Group |
External links