Pat Metheny
Trio Live

Content-wise impressive. The double CD edited at the end of 2000 collects the live exploits of the trio: Pat Metheny, Larry Grenadier, and Bill Stewart.

The trio had already delighted the public in 1999 with the self-titled studio album, but enclosed in this gem of a CD are some explorations that the band enjoyed incorporating into their various stops around the world and a few unreleased tracks.

One wonders if the real anticipation, when a new creation by Metheny is on the horizon, is more for the studio CD or for the subsequent, now canonical, world tour, where the band of the moment outlines the definitive sound and delights the palates of the most refined Jazz Fusion listeners and variants.

The result is decidedly impressive. For a touch of freshness, Pat makes use of the maximum resources of very young artists who pay homage to his sounds with complete devotion. The challenge is to go far beyond the tracks prepared for the CD. Here it spans pieces of incredible temporal and content distance, so different and distant from each other, yet representative.

The first CD opens with the historic "Bright Size Life" and in the courageous reinterpretation, bassist Grenadier imposes himself and is up to the level of the first legendary performer, Jaco Pastorius. Pat, in this piece as in others, knows how to create color, sound, and at times distances himself from what is known to propose something that enjoys particularity and surprise effect. Surges, accelerations, rhythms that often clarify the versatility, not only executively but also compositionally.

Follows "Question And Answer" which recalls the work of the previous trio (1990), where Roy Haynes and Dave Holland were in conversation with bass and percussion.

Indispensable, essential, is the dizzying standard by John Coltrane "Giant Steps" and I emphasize that Metheny's rearrangement is of astonishing and incredible effectiveness. Majestic Pat. He turns the piece inside out, enriches it, saddens it, colors it, and gives it depth. All while respecting it entirely. A transformation worthy of a master of absolute skill. Another reinterpretation, truthfully curious, for the standard "All The Things You Are", rendered vibrant and showy by the musicians' skill.

Challenge and runway for the Pikasso (the 42-string) in the track "Into The Dream" just to savor the use of this incredible instrument that looks more like a harp than a guitar. Those who have seen it live cannot have forgotten.

In the second CD, it moves from old tracks like "James", sober, essential, and playful, and "Unity Village" (from "Watercolors" of 1977), a piece almost unchanged.

The novelties, or rather, the unreleased tracks are "Night Turn Into Day", "Faith Healer", and "Counting Texas". If the first piece proves to be a very slow ballad, the second awakens with unthinkable distortions. A sort of well-matched screech in homage to the free jazz that maestro Coleman has injected into Pat. See "Song X" and "Zero Tolerance For Silence" to believe it. An episode of certain interest also the third: it's a semi-blues gem, with free jazz semblances and long improvisation. Valid.

Of course, those who had the fortune to see this trio live cannot but remember the event as one of the greatest expressions of the genre. If the group amazes with the studio CD, with the live performance it renews itself and further projects the listener to a total understanding of the work, to the great value of the group, and to the pure intrinsic energy of each individual piece.