专辑英文名: Highway Rider
歌手: Brad Mehldau
音乐风格: 爵士
资源格式: FLAC
版本: [2CD]
发行时间: 2010年02月22日
地区: 美国
语言: 英语
简介:
出品厂牌：Nonesuch
专辑时长：102:30 分钟
音乐风格：Jazz, Piano, Contemporary Jazz
专辑介绍：
Brad Mehldau，六岁开始学习古典音乐，十五岁时已在俱乐部中表演.当他在读高中时期，就已获得了爵士名校波士顿百克里音乐学院所举办比赛的最佳音乐奖。除了持续学习古典以外，他同时亦研究爵士乐与现代音乐。
1988年Brad Mehldau迁居纽约并就读于纽约曼哈顿新学校，受教与名钢琴家Fred Hersh和Junior Mance门下，他们当时便已预言：这年青人将会出人头地！进入九十年代之后Brad Mehldau与次中音萨克斯风手Joshua Redman合作。
1995年发行的Introducing Brad Mehldau是他第一张专辑，曲目大多属于爵士经典曲，但当时并未有太大的回响。
1998年十一月号的美国Keyboard杂志评选出六位爵士钢琴新星，分别是Diana Krall、Cyrus Chestnut、Benny Green、Brad Mehldau、Geoff Keezer与Loston Harris，与此同时Brad Mehldau也被爵士权威杂志Down Beat票选最佳爵士艺人前三名，短短十年已成为爵士界新一代的钢琴名家。
Brad Mehldau前七张作品中最着名的作品便是以三重奏形式完成的「Art Of The Trio」系列专辑。三重奏以Mehldau的钢琴加上贝斯手Larry Grenadier以及鼓手Jorge Rossy在1994年正式成立。「Art Of The Trio」第一集中的Blame It On My Youth曾获葛莱美奖最佳爵士演奏的提名；Mehler本人也多次为爵士权威杂誌Down Beat票选最佳艺人前三名。
本专辑为Brad Mehldau于2010年最新的双CD作品，和资深制作人Jon Brion第二次合作联手打造。
The Highway Rider is pianist and composer Brad Mehldau's second collaboration with enigmatic pop producer Jon Brion. The first was 2002's ambitious but tentative Largo. As a collaboration, The Highway Rider is much more confident by contrast. Mehldau's most ambitious work to date, its 15 compositions are spread over two discs and 100 minutes. His trio --bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jeff Ballard -- is augmented by saxophonist Joshua Redman, drummer Matt Chamberlain, and a chamber orchestra conducted by Dan Coleman. The album is a narrative jazz suite, orchestrated and arranged by Mehldau, though it has much in common with classical and pop music, as well.
Nonesuch Records releases Highway Rider—a double-disc of original work by pianist and composer Brad Mehldau—on March 16, 2010. The album is his second collaboration with renowned producer Jon Brion and features performances by Mehldau's trio—drummer Jeff Ballard and bassist Larry Grenadier—as well as drummer Matt Chamberlain, saxophonist Joshua Redman, and a chamber orchestra led by Dan Coleman. Mehldau also orchestrated and arranged the album's 15 pieces for the ensemble.
Although Brad Mehldau is best known as a jazz composer and improviser, he has written several long-form compositions and songs, including an orchestral piece called The Brady Bunch Variations for the Orchestre National d'?le-de-France and two Carnegie Hall commissions: Love Songs for mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter and Love Sublime for soprano Renée Fleming.
"It's so exciting to write something and have it in your head and then hear it for the first time being played by these magnificent musicians," he says. "It's really an emotional experience. I'm still reeling from it."
"For me, the biggest challenge was the orchestration—which notes to assign to what instruments. I've been studying lots of orchestral scores for a while now—Strauss, Brahms, Tchaikovsky; a lot of big romantic stuff in particular. But while I was writing, I was also listening closely to modern orchestrators and arrangers, and there are two who have made an impact on me especially—Fran?ois Rauber in his work with Jacques Brel, and Bob Alcivar in his work with Tom Waits."
Jon Brion also produced Mehldau's 2002 album Largo, and Mehldau had been hoping to work with him again since then. "I knew from working with Jon on Largo that he was the guy who would find a way to put all the pieces together for this project. It was really quite a beast sonically at some points—two drummers playing at the same time, bass, sax, and piano, and then the orchestra on top of that. I wanted to record everything live whenever possible but wasn't sure if we could do it. The first conversation with Jon about the music, that was for him a done deal—it had to be live, with the orchestra and the jazz group playing together. Jon had the foresight during the recording, and then a great deal of craft during the mixing, to bring it all together and sound like it does. And we were able to avoid what the conductor Dan Coleman jokingly referred to as 'disco strings'—that is, adding the orchestra onto the jazz group's performance after the fact."
Largo was a step in a new direction for the pianist, incorporating horns, strings, vibes, and electronic instruments—as well as Brion's unique production touches. As Brion points out, though, "This time around—having done these classical things of late, and these different commissioned pieces he's had to write—was a completely different thing. It's like, 'OK, I know what I learned from doing that last one. This time I have a specific angle.'"
Credits:
MUSICIANS
*Brad Mehldau, piano (CD1:1-5, 7; CD2:1-6, 8), pump organ (CD1:2; CD2:3), Yamaha CS-80 (CD1:4), orchestral bells (CD1:7; CD2:1, 8); handclaps (CD2:2)
*Jeff Ballard, percussion (CD1:1, 5; CD2:2), snare brush (CD1:2), drums (CD1:7; CD2:1, 4, 6, 8); handclaps (CD2:2)
*Joshua Redman, soprano saxophone (CD1:1, 5; CD2:2, 8), tenor saxophone (CD1:2, 7; CD2:1, 3, 5); handclaps (CD2:2)
*Larry Grenadier, bass (CD1:2, 4, 7; CD2:1, 3, 4, 6, 8); handclaps (CD2:2)
*Matt Chamberlain, drums (CD1:2, 4, 5, 7, 8; CD2:2, 3); handclaps (CD2:2)
*Orchestra, Dan Coleman, conductor (CD1:1, 2, 6, 7; CD2:1, 7, 8)
*Brad, Josh, Dan, Matt, Jeff, and special guests The Fleurettes, la la la vocals (CD1:5)
PRODUCTION
Produced by Jon Brion
Engineered by Gregg Koller
Mixed by Gregg Koller and Jon Brion
Pro Tools Engineer: Eric Caudieux
Mastered by Alan Yoshida
Recorded, mixed, and mastered February 16–28 and May 12–19, 2009, at Ocean Way Studios, Hollywood, CA
All music composed, arranged, and orchestrated by Brad Mehldau
Copyists: Suzie Katayama, Dwight Mikkelsen, Kirby Furlong, Elizabeth Kinnon, Caryn Rasmussen, Victor Sagerquist
Graphic Design by Lawrence Azerrad
Cover photograph: “Drive-In Theatre, Las Vegas, 1987,” by Richard Misrach, courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, Pace/MacGill Gallery and Marc Selwyn Fine Arts
Executive Producer: Robert Hurwitz
http://www.bradmehldau.com
Brad Mehldau Biography
Jazz pianist Brad Mehldau has recorded and performed extensively since the early 1990s. Mehldau's most consistent output over the years has taken place in the trio format. Starting in 1996, his group released a series of five records on Warner Bros. entitled The Art of the Trio. Mehldau also has a solo piano recording entitled Elegiac Cycle, and a record called Places that includes both solo piano and trio songs. Elegiac Cycle and Places might be called “concept” albums. They are made up exclusively of original material and have central themes that hover over the compositions. Other Mehldau recordings include Largo, a collaborative effort with the innovative musician and producer Jon Brion, and Anything Goes—a trio outing with bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jorge Rossy.
His first record for Nonesuch, Brad Mehldau Live in Tokyo, was released in September 2004. After ten rewarding years with Rossy playing in Mehldau's regular trio, drummer Jeff Ballard joined the band in 2005. The label released its first album from the Brad Mehldau Trio—Day is Done—on September 27, 2005. An exciting double live trio recording entitled Brad Mehldau Trio Live was released on March 25th, 2008 (Nonesuch) to critical acclaim. In early 2010 Nonesuch will release a double-disc of original work entitled Highway Rider, the highly anticipated follow up to Largo. The album is Mehldau's second collaboration with renowned producer Jon Brion and features performances by Mehldau's trio—drummer Jeff Ballard and bassist Larry Grenadier—as well as percussionist Matt Chamberlain, saxophonist Joshua Redman, and a chamber orchestra led by Dan Coleman.
Mehldau's musical personality forms a dichotomy. He is first and foremost an improviser, and greatly cherishes the surprise and wonder that can occur from a spontaneous musical idea that is expressed directly, in real time. But he also has a deep fascination for the formal architecture of music, and it informs everything he plays. In his most inspired playing, the actual structure of his musical thought serves as an expressive device. As he plays, he listens to how ideas unwind, and the order in which they reveal themselves. Each tune has a strongly felt narrative arch, whether it expresses itself in a beginning, an end, or something left intentionally open-ended. The two sides of Mehldau's personality—the improviser and the formalist—play off each other, and the effect is often something like controlled chaos.
Mehldau has performed around the world at a steady pace since the mid-1990s, with his trio and as a solo pianist. His performances convey a wide range of expression. There is often an intellectual rigor to the continuous process of abstraction that may take place on a given tune, and a certain density of information. That could be followed by a stripped down, emotionally direct ballad. Mehldau favors juxtaposing extremes. He has attracted a sizeable following over the years, one that has grown to expect a singular, intense experience in his performance.
In addition to his trio and solo projects, Mehldau has worked with a number of great jazz musicians, including a rewarding gig with saxophonist Joshua Redman's band for two years, recordings and concerts with Pat Metheny, Charlie Haden and Lee Konitz, and recording as a sideman with the likes of Michael Brecker, Wayne Shorter, John Scofield, and Charles Lloyd. For more than a decade, he has collaborated with several musicians and peers whom he respects greatly, including the guitarists Peter Bernstein and Kurt Rosenwinkel and tenor saxophonist Mark Turner. Mehldau also has played on a number of recordings outside of the jazz idiom, like Willie Nelson's Teatro and singer-songwriter Joe Henry's Scar. His music has appeared in several movies, including Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut and Wim Wender's Million Dollar Hotel. He also composed an original soundtrack for the French film, Ma Femme Est Une Actrice. Mehldau recently composed two new works commissioned by Carnegie Hall for voice and piano, The Blue Estuaries and The Book of Hours: Love Poems to God, which were performed in the spring of 2005 with the acclaimed classical soprano, Renee Fleming. These songs were recorded with Fleming and released in 2006 on the Love Sublime record; simultaneously, Nonesuch released an album of Mehldau's jazz compositions for trio entitled House on Hill. In March 2007 Mehldau debuted the piano concerto "The Brady Bunch Variations for piano and orchestra" at Theatre du Chatelet in Paris with Orchestre national d'Ile-de-France. In early 2008 London's Wigmore Hall announced that Brad Mehldau will curate an annual four-concert jazz series at the prestigious hall during its 2009-10 and 2010-11 seasons, with Mehldau appearing in at least two of the four annual concerts.
