Resonance Records goes out of its way again to unearth yet another significant chapter in jazz history, and once again, it's one that relatively few fans have ever heard. This performance of Jaco Pastorius' Word of Mouth Big Band was captured during George Wein's Kool Jazz Festival at Avery Fisher Hall. It was broadcast on NPR's Jazz Alive program, but this double disc contains the entire performance, with more than 40 minutes of additional music.
The collection comprises ten discs, including all eight of her solo studio albums from the past three decades; Butterfly, a new studio set featuring four new songs and six reinterpreted selections from her catalog, all arranged for string quartet; and Rarities, a collection of fifteen rare and previously unreleased tracks recorded between 1998 and 2017, which offers a unique view of Merchant's creative experimentation through home studio demos, album outtakes, live tracks, and collaborations with diverse artists like Billy Bragg, David Byrne, The Chieftains, Cowboy Junkies, and Amy Helm.