Brad Mehldau Live In Marciac (2011) [2cd+dvd] { Nonesuch} [re Up]

Brad Mehldau’s Variations on a Melancholy Theme will be released June 11, 2021, on Nonesuch Records. The recording features the pianist/composer and Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, which commissioned this orchestral version of the work, which comprises a theme and eleven variations plus a cadenza and postlude; the album also includes an encore, “Variations ‘X’ and ‘Y.’” You can watch a video with excerpts from the piece below. (Mehldau originally composed Variations on a Melancholy Theme for pianist Kirill Gerstein.) Mehldau and Orpheus toured Europe, Russia, and the US with the piece, including a 2013 performance at Carnegie Hall. Speaking to the combination of classical form with jazz harmonies in the work’s musical language, Mehldau wrote, “I imagine it as if Brahms woke up one day and had the blues.”

The members of the legendary original 1990s Joshua Redman Quartet—Joshua Redman (saxophone), Brad Mehldau (piano), Christian McBride (bass), and Brian Blade (drums)—reunited after twenty-six years after their 1994 debut album, MoodSwing, for 2020’s RoundAgain; they return now with LongGone, out now. The new album features original Redman compositions from the RoundAgain recording sessions, plus a live performance of the MoodSwing track “Rejoice,” captured by SFJAZZ at the San Francisco Jazz Festival.

The members of the legendary original 1990s Joshua Redman Quartet—Joshua Redman (saxophone), Brad Mehldau (piano), Christian McBride (bass), and Brian Blade (drums)—reunited after twenty-six years after their 1994 debut album, MoodSwing, for 2020’s RoundAgain; they return now with LongGone, out now. The new album features original Redman compositions from the RoundAgain recording sessions, plus a live performance of the MoodSwing track “Rejoice,” captured by SFJAZZ at the San Francisco Jazz Festival.

While sheltering at home with his family in the Netherlands during the COVID-19 pandemic, Brad Mehldau wrote 12 new songs about what he was experiencing; he was able to record them safely in an Amsterdam studio, along with tunes by Neil Young, Billy Joel, and Jerome Kern, for the album 'Suite: April 2020.

Of all the ‘80s bands that once ruled the hair metal roost, few soldiered through the following decades with as much tenacity as Def Leppard, who scored hits during the grunge era (“Let’s Get Rocked,” “Two Steps Behind”) and the late-‘90s teen pop revival (“Promises”) before quietly fading from the charts. The group then whipped itself into a touring juggernaut, spending nearly every summer on the road with AOR titans like Journey and REO Speedwagon. On Mirror Ball – the band’s first live release, unless you count the out of print Live: In the Clubs, In Your Face EP from 1993 – the guys are all pushing 50, yet the band doesn’t sound all that removed from its Reagan-era heyday…

Multi-GRAMMY® winning jazz pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba and both GRAMMY® and Latin GRAMMY® winning vocalist Aymée Nuviola present a collective mastery on their latest collaboration, Live in Marciac, due out May 27 on 5Passion Records. Live in Marciac captures an evocative and timeless live concert, full of Latin jazz classics and a few originals, from the duo’s 2021 tour performance at the Jazz in Marciac festival in France at the Chapiteau Concert Hall…

Saga have had their share of lineup changes along the way; one of the most talked about came in late 2007, when longtime frontman Michael Sadler left the band (Rob Moratti was hired as a replacement the following year). Sadler had been Saga's lead singer from the beginning; he was around back when the Canadian prog rockers were still calling themselves Pockets (which was also the name of an Earth, Wind & Fire-ish soul-funk band that recorded three LPs for Columbia in the late '70s), and his departure came after no less than 30 years with the band. Documenting a 2007 show in Munich, Germany, Contact: Live in Munich was recorded/filmed during Sadler's final tour with Saga…

Creedence Clearwater Revival's music is still a staple of American and worldwide radio airplay. The band, led by front man and composer Tom Fogerty, has sold over 30 million albums worldwide and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993. The live DVD recordeed in Argentina features nearly all their hits such as: Born on the bayou, Who’ll stop the rain, Susie Q, Hey tonight, Long as I can see the light, I heard it through the grapevine, I put a spell on you, Have you ever seen the rain and many others.

Recorded in Virginia on Keith’s 38th birthday, the Hampton show was one of the first ever pay-per-view events on television. Now mixed by Bob Clearmountain, the energy in the band’s performance is palpable. The new sound mix by Bob Clearmountain is perfect and the restored video is gorgeous!…