Pat Metheny’s Cinematic Vision

By Bobby Reed I Dec. 4, 2020

Guitarist Pat Metheny topped two DownBeat Readers Poll categories this year: Guitar and Jazz Album, for his disc *From This Place* (Nonesuch).
(Photo: Jimmy & Dena Katz)

“By the time I was pretty well into my thing as a bandleader, I started pushing more into the idea of using the studio itself as an instrument.”

For Metheny, who has long embraced technology as an integral component to his art, recent advancements in computer-based recording have opened up endless vistas: “The lines have blurred for me now between composer, bandleader, producer, editor, presentation MC,” he said. “To me, it’s all one thing.”

On From This Place, those ideas are manifest dramatically on the 13-minute track “America Undefined.” It features a muscular melody before shifting into a sonic collage segment, with sounds that resemble trains, crossing-signal bells and airplanes, plus other mysterious elements interwoven with voices.

“That particular track,” Metheny said, “is obviously on the Steven Spielberg side of things, as opposed to the Frederick Wiseman side of things—in terms of, you know, a method for how to do something.”

Metheny did some of the orchestral arrangements for the album, but he also recruited two ace arrangers: Gil Goldstein, who worked on five tracks, and Alan Broadbent, who worked on four.

Broadbent—a pianist who leads his own improv-oriented trio and who formerly worked for legendary orchestrator Nelson Riddle—devised a lush orchestral arrangement that injects a timeless quality to the album’s closing track, “Love May Take A While.”

“The reason I was hired is that Pat wanted my feedback and ideas,” Broadbent said via videoconference from his home in Orange, New Jersey. “Pat gave me free rein. A lot of [bandleaders] want you to orchestrate their ideas and, you know, that’s hackwork. And I’ve done it a couple of times for people who I won’t mention. But Pat wanted me to add what I could to what he had realized. So, I added my two cents’ worth to the [existing] tracks.”

In the coming months, Metheny plans to compose more music for his trio project Side-Eye, which had played shows prior to the pandemic. That band, which he said was conceptualized to have a fluid cast of personnel, currently includes pianist/keyboardist James Francies and drummer Joe Dyson.

Metheny, who was inducted into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 2013, explained that he keeps a close watch on young, up-and-coming musicians on the jazz scene. He noted that he is always on the lookout for players who can offer something more than just great chops.