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. Early 2009 will find Mehldau and producer Jon Brion collaborating once again for the highly anticipated follow-up to Largo. 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.
BRAD MEHLDAU DISCOGRAPHY
As Leader
Brad Mehldau Trio Live; House On Hill; Day Is Done; Live in Tokyo; Anything Goes; Largo; Progression – Art of the Trio, Volume 5; Places; Art of the Trio 4 – Back at the Vanguard; Elegiac Cycle; Art of the Trio Volume 3 – Songs; Art of the Trio Volume 2 - Live at the Village Vanguard; Art of the Trio Volume 1; Introducing Brad Mehldau.
As Co-Leader
Quartet (Pat Metheny), 2007; Metheny Mehldau, 2006; Love Sublime, 2006; Close Enough for Love- Fleurine, 2000; NY Barcelona Crossing; NY Barcelona Crossing #2; When I Fall In Love -Mehldau & Rossy Trio
As Sideman
Pilgrimage – Michael Brecker; Timeless Tales - Joshua Redman Quartet; In This World - Mark Turner; Teatro - Willie Nelson; Moodswing - Joshua Redman Quartet; Alone Together - Lee Konitz/Charlie Haden; Warner Jams, Volume One; Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil Soundtrack; Warner Bros. Jazz Christmas Party; Something Blue – Lee Konitz/Charlie Haden; Young at Heart - Jessie Davis; Downtown Sounds - Grant Stewart; Ademuz - Perico Sambert + 10; Somethings Burnin’ - Peter Bernstein; Signs of Life – Peter Bernstein; Brad Mehldau Solo Rider 2008-2009 10 of 12
Career Highlights:
• 2008 Top 20 Talents to Watch in 2008 – The Daily Telegraph (UK)
• 2007 Best Artist: Piano – Downbeat Reader’s Poll
• 2006 Miles Davis Award – Montreal Jazz Fest
• 2004 Best Artist: Piano - Down Beat Readers Poll
• 1999 Grammy Nominee – Best Jazz Instrumental Art of the Trio 4, Back at the Vanguard
• Top 10 Album of 1999 Time Magazine – Elegiac Cycle
• “Jazz Pianist of the Year” 1999, 2000 and 2002 Down Beat Readers Poll
• Best Jazz Artist of 1999 Musica Jazz Critics Poll (Italy)
• #1 Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition Acoustic Jazz Piano -1997, 1998 & 1999 Down Beat Critics Poll
• #1 Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition Acoustic Jazz Group - 1998 & 1999 Down Beat Critics Poll
•"Choc" Award 1999 Le Monde de la Musique - Elegiac Cycle
• New Star of 1998 - Swing Journal Disc Award (Japan)
• Best Jazz Album of the Year 1998: Songs - Jazzman magazine (France)
• Best Foreign Musician of the Year - D’Jango d’Or 98 (France)
• The Best CD of 1997 - Acadamie du Jazz (France)
• 1997 Grammy Nominee - Best Jazz Instrumental Solo
• 1997 UPI Top 10 – Art Of The Trio, Vol. 1 - Jazz Album of the Year
• Best New Artist of 1997 - Jazz Times Readers Poll
• Best New Talent of 1997 - Musica Jazz Critics Poll (Italy)
• Debut Artist of the Year 1997 - New York Jazz Awards
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