Pat Metheny

Guitarist, composer, and bandleader Pat Metheny stands alone as the sole musician to claim 20 Grammy Awards spread across ten distinct categories. A restless innovator whose personal language fuses an unmistakable harmonic warmth with Afro-Latin and Brazilian influences, rock, funk, worldwide folk traditions, and jazz, he first reached listeners through the 1976 release Bright Size Life and the self-titled Pat Metheny Group album that followed in 1978, both praised for their buoyant melodies and rhythmic invention. The 1981 collaboration As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls with keyboardist Lyle Mays reached the summit of the jazz album chart. The Pat Metheny Group earned its initial Grammy with the 1982 album Offramp. In 1986 Metheny joined Ornette Coleman for the recording Song X. Still Life (Talking) from 1987 and Letter from Home from 1989 each attained gold status. Secret Story, issued in 1992, brought together the Pat Metheny Group with the Pinpeat Orchestra, the London Orchestra, the Choir of the Cambodian Royal Palace, and harmonica player Toots Thielemans. The 2011 solo acoustic project What’s It All About received a Grammy for Best New Age Album. Metheny was designated an NEA Jazz Master in 2018. Road to the Sun, released in 2021, contained his earliest compositions written for classical guitar. Later that same year Side-Eye NYC (V1.IV) launched an open-ended series in which varying rhythm sections reinterpret both fresh and older material. In 2023 he issued the solo album Dream Box, then, for the first time, followed it the next year with another solo guitar recording, MoonDial.

Born in 1954 in Lee’s Summit, Missouri, Metheny grew up alongside his older brother, trumpeter Mike Metheny, and began on trumpet himself. The Beatles’ arrival in 1964 prompted a switch to guitar at age twelve; his abilities advanced rapidly. While still a teenager he taught at the University of Miami and at Berklee, and he made his first appearance on record in 1974 alongside Paul Bley and Jaco Pastorius. Between 1974 and 1977 he performed with Gary Burton’s ensemble, where he encountered keyboardist Lyle Mays; in 1978 the two formed the Pat Metheny Group, initially completed by bassist Mark Egan and drummer Dan Gottlieb. Within a few years Metheny had become ECM’s leading seller and one of jazz’s most widely attended artists, filling large venues. He consistently steered clear of formulaic playing, and his side projects remained distinctive: the 1980 quintet date 80/81 featured Dewey Redman and Michael Brecker; a 1983 trio session united him with Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins; and two years later he again recorded with Ornette Coleman on Song X. Additional ventures outside the group included a sideman appearance with Sonny Rollins, a 1990 quartet tour with Herbie Hancock, a trio album with Dave Holland and Roy Haynes, and a collaboration with Joshua Redman.

The 1994 solo album Zero Tolerance for Silence, built entirely from noise and feedback, startled longtime listeners, yet Metheny’s standing as an inventive performer endured. That year he made his Blue Note debut on the duet recording I Can See Your House from Here with John Scofield. The following year brought the Pat Metheny Group’s We Live Here, the 1996 album Quartet, and the film score Passaggio Per Il Paradiso. In 1997 he and Charlie Haden recorded the acoustic duo album Beyond the Missouri Sky (Short Stories). After signing with Warner Bros. he released Imaginary Day. The 1999 duet project Jim Hall & Pat Metheny appeared on Telarc, while his score for A Map of the World came out on Warner Bros.

Throughout the twenty-first century Metheny has continued to record prolifically, issuing Speaking of Now in 2002, the solo acoustic One Quiet Night in 2003, the Pat Metheny Group’s The Way Up in 2005, and Metheny Mehldau in 2006. A second studio meeting with Brad Mehldau produced the 2007 album Quartet. The trio date Day Trip appeared in 2008. Early in 2010 Nonesuch released Orchestrion, on which Metheny performed alone using a collection of acoustic instruments constructed for him by Eric Singer. June 2011 saw the second solo acoustic album What’s It All About, consisting entirely of covers of songs by Paul Simon, Lennon-McCartney, Antônio Carlos Jobim, Burt Bacharach, and Hal David that had long held personal significance. Unity Band, recorded with saxophonist Chris Potter, drummer Antonio Sanchez, and bassist Ben Williams, emerged in June 2012; two months later the live document The Orchestrion Project captured performances from the 2010–2011 solo tour. In spring 2013 Metheny interpreted compositions by John Zorn on Tap: John Zorn’s Book of Angels, Vol. 20, issued jointly by Tzadik and Nonesuch. The Unity Group returned to the studio for the 2014 release Kin (←→). January 2015 found Metheny participating in a concert tribute to bassist Eberhard Weber that was later released by ECM as Hommage à Eberhard Weber, co-credited with Jan Garbarek and Gary Burton. He next issued the live set Unity Sessions and joined trumpeter Cuong Vu for the 2016 album Cuong Vu Trio Meets Pat Metheny. Shortly afterward he assembled a quartet with Sanchez, bassist Linda May Han Oh, and pianist Gwilym Simcock; after two years of touring the group recorded From This Place, released in February 2020 and augmented by the Hollywood Studio Symphony under Joel McNeely plus vocalists and guests Meshell Ndegeocello, Grégoire Maret, and Luis Conte.

In 2020 Metheny ended a relationship of more than two decades with WEA/Nonesuch and moved to BMG’s Modern Recordings. His first project for the label, Road to the Sun, appeared in March 2021 and consisted solely of his compositions, performed without his own instrumental contribution: the four-movement guitar sonata “Four Paths of Light” was written for Jason Vieaux, while the six-movement title suite was composed for and played by the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet. September brought the Grammy-nominated live trio album Side-Eye NYC (V1.IV) featuring keyboardist James Francies and drummer Marcus Gilmore, the initial installment in a planned series of trio recordings pairing Metheny with different, frequently younger rhythm sections. Over many years Metheny had accumulated informal recordings on a hard drive. Following 160 international concerts in 2022 he reviewed the archive and discovered the fragments formed a coherent sequence; none of the original takes had been revisited, and most were no longer consciously recalled. The resulting compilation, Dream Box, was issued by Modern Recordings in 2023 and earned a nomination for Best Jazz Instrumental Album at the 66th Grammy Awards.

While touring extensively with solo acoustic guitar, Metheny began considering the sonic distinctions among his previous unaccompanied recordings. He commissioned luthier Linda Manzer to construct an acoustic baritone guitar fitted with nylon rather than steel strings and tuned according to a method shown to him in childhood by a Missouri neighbor. After locating nylon strings from an Argentine maker that would hold the tuning without breaking or producing a banjo-like tone, he experienced an immediate revelation upon playing the instrument and began featuring it regularly during the Dream Box tour. During a subsequent pause he entered the studio to document its sound while it remained fresh, recording newly written pieces, revisiting earlier catalog material, and adding several standards, a folk song, and a Beatles song. The resulting album, MoonDial, was released by Modern Recordings in July 2024.