Metheny/Mehldau is a jazz album released in 2006 by Nonesuch Records, and a collaboration between guitarist/composer Pat Metheny and jazz pianist Brad Mehldau, consisting of ten original tracks, with two joined by Mehldau's drummer Jeff Ballard and bassist Larry Grenadier.
Pat Metheny | Brad Mehldau | Pat Metheny Group | Kevin Metheny |
As with other pieces by Reich, this piece has influenced many modern musical artists, such as the Orb, which sampled the third movement of the Pat Metheny recording as one of the hooks of "Little Fluffy Clouds," and RJD2, who sampled the piece's opening of his song "The Proxy" from his first release, Deadringer. In 2008 Joby Burgess' Powerplant arranged the work for xylosynth, taking influence from Metheny and the Orb.
The trio collaborated with several artists, including Pat Metheny and a The Vinyl Trilogy album with countryman Nicolai Dunger.
In 2002 took part in the Anna Maria Jopek & Friends with Pat Metheny Intoxication (album) and two shows at the Congress Hall in Warsaw, with the winner of 15 Grammy Awards, guitarist Pat Metheny.
Composer, arranger and trombonist Bob Curnow performed a version of "Minuano (Six Eight)" on the album, "Bob Curnow’s L.A. Big Band Plays The Music of Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays".
The Guardian's John Fordham observed "The way in which Mehldau develops improvisations thematically - eventually interweaving fragments of the original tune and spontaneous motifs until the pieces take on the character of 10-minute compositions rather than variations on much shorter originals - grows increasingly riveting".
The album features mutual Metheny/Coleman collaborator Charlie Haden on bass, Jack DeJohnette on drums, and Coleman's son Denardo on various percussion instruments.
The tunes are apparently influenced by the works of contemporary composer Steve Reich, with whom Pat Metheny has collaborated in the past.
The album covers a mixture of standards, older pieces by Metheny (such as the title track from his debut album Bright Size Life) and recent compositions.
Kai Eckhardt (bass), later with John McLaughlin, and Torsten de Winkel (guitar), later with the Pat Metheny Group, joined Vital Information in 1986 and 1987 for tours in the United States and Europe and appeared on and composed for the group's next album, Fiafiaga (1988), which generally continued with the Global Beat direction but added computer-based and funkier sounds to the stylistic mix.
Some, including many of Metheny's most devoted fans, felt that the album was a cataclysmic artistic mistake, and fan forums have from time to time attempted to pressure Metheny into disowning the recording.