File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 57:51
Size: 134,3 MB
Art: Front
(3:44) 1. Better Days Ahead
(4:39) 2. Spring Ain't Here
(8:17) 3. April Wind/Phase Dance
(5:18) 4. September Fifteenth
(4:19) 5. James
(5:52) 6. Antonia
(4:50) 7. (It's Just) Talk
(2:26) 8. Letter From Home
(5:58) 9. If I Could
(4:09) 10. Last Train Home
(2:49) 11. From This Place
(3:09) 12. The Bat
(2:15) 13. Farmer's Trust
Better Days Ahead features both signature songs and deep cuts from Metheny’s prolific career, including material dating back from The Pat Metheny Group’s influential eponymous album from 1978, through the title track of 2020’s Grammy-nominated From This Place. Though it contains some gloriously meditative music, the album was created in a perfect storm. “Two weeks after canceling all my live performances on April 1, 2020” remembers John, “my father, Bucky passed away from the Coronavirus. Five days after that I turned sixty, and two days later my mother Ruth was taken by the same virus. After sixty years of marriage, and within one week of each other, both my parents were gone.”
As a way to deal with the pain, Pizzarelli developed these musical interpretations in early-morning sessions, alone with his guitar. “I had watched my father do this my whole life,” he remembers. “Before we ventured out to a day filled with recording sessions, ‘The Tonight Show,’ or late-night jazz gigs, he would practice classical pieces. So that’s what I felt compelled to do during this rough period. I started out playing standards, but then felt drawn to the idea of deconstructing Pat Metheny’s group arrangements from my seven-string guitar. I had loved the recordings of the Pat Metheny Group since I was a teenager, and I welcomed the challenge of diving deep into his canon of remarkably dense and moving material. Every day, it was a miraculous diversion from my own personal grief and the tragedy of the pandemic I saw unfolding on the nightly news.”
Coincidentally, Metheny reached out to Pizzarelli to send condolences on his recent loss. “When I told him I had been working on his songs, Pat graciously sent me a treasure trove of his lead sheets. Now, I could hold this music in my hands and dive into every note. It’s like the holy grail to get that from a composer!”
Metheny himself offered kind words of encouragement: “I have admired John for years as a fantastic musician with an amazing ability to communicate. His love and understanding of classic song forms runs deep, almost as a birthright, thanks to having grown up on the knee of one of the greatest guitarists ever, his dad Bucky. His vast reserve of knowledge into the nuts and bolts of why those Great American Songbook tunes have the musical impact they do continually give his performances an insightful edge that connects him with a deep tradition. His life in music brings authority and insight that is increasingly rare as time moves on. To say it was flattering to have John address these tunes, knowing all the great music he has been around his whole life, is an understatement. It is an incredible honor for me.”(To be continued) https://www.thekurlandagency.com/2021/04/14/new-album-john-pizzarellis-better-days-ahead-a-solo-guitar-celebration-of-pat-metheny/
As a way to deal with the pain, Pizzarelli developed these musical interpretations in early-morning sessions, alone with his guitar. “I had watched my father do this my whole life,” he remembers. “Before we ventured out to a day filled with recording sessions, ‘The Tonight Show,’ or late-night jazz gigs, he would practice classical pieces. So that’s what I felt compelled to do during this rough period. I started out playing standards, but then felt drawn to the idea of deconstructing Pat Metheny’s group arrangements from my seven-string guitar. I had loved the recordings of the Pat Metheny Group since I was a teenager, and I welcomed the challenge of diving deep into his canon of remarkably dense and moving material. Every day, it was a miraculous diversion from my own personal grief and the tragedy of the pandemic I saw unfolding on the nightly news.”
Coincidentally, Metheny reached out to Pizzarelli to send condolences on his recent loss. “When I told him I had been working on his songs, Pat graciously sent me a treasure trove of his lead sheets. Now, I could hold this music in my hands and dive into every note. It’s like the holy grail to get that from a composer!”
Metheny himself offered kind words of encouragement: “I have admired John for years as a fantastic musician with an amazing ability to communicate. His love and understanding of classic song forms runs deep, almost as a birthright, thanks to having grown up on the knee of one of the greatest guitarists ever, his dad Bucky. His vast reserve of knowledge into the nuts and bolts of why those Great American Songbook tunes have the musical impact they do continually give his performances an insightful edge that connects him with a deep tradition. His life in music brings authority and insight that is increasingly rare as time moves on. To say it was flattering to have John address these tunes, knowing all the great music he has been around his whole life, is an understatement. It is an incredible honor for me.”(To be continued) https://www.thekurlandagency.com/2021/04/14/new-album-john-pizzarellis-better-days-ahead-a-solo-guitar-celebration-of-pat-metheny/
Better Days Ahead (Solo Guitar Takes on Pat Metheny)
Really looking forward to this one. Many thanks, Giullia.
ReplyDeleteThank you as always Pmac!
Deletethanks for this one!
ReplyDeleteThank you Bless!
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