Jazz piano romantic Brad Mehldau solo at the Prinzregententheater – Munich

“I’m happy to finally be here,” Brad Mehldau begins his first announcement after half an hour, “thank you for your patience.” His performance at the Prinzregententheater had been postponed four times for two years. Those who had kept their ticket now got what looked like a sham: instead of playing with the trio that had been announced at the time, Mehldau played solo. But what certainly very few people wanted to complain about, is that his solo performances are comparatively rare. And you can fathom its secrets even more clearly, with a more colorfully mixed program than usual.

Two radiohead-Songs he had with him, for example, some of his own compositions, a David Bowie, a Neil Young or a Gershwin as the last of three encores. But also a remarkable outlook on what has recently been developed beatles-Program with less well-known titles such as “I Am The Walrus”, “Dear Prudence”, “Golden Slumbers” transformed into a bouncer lullaby or “Your Mother Should Know”, which lends the title to the album that will be released in spring. A pop potpourri as a base camp for the expeditions into the realm of Mehldau music.

His method initially includes the reduction to the essentials. The melody is almost always introduced very gently, often accompanied in two parts by the most remarkable left hand of all jazz pianists. Then it is varied, enriched with swing or groove, dynamically increased, led through half of music history, transformed into an etude or an anthem. Even repetitions are never the same, Mehldau always comes up with something different when he seems to be crawling into the keyboard in his typically low posture. The result is still the alchemical squaring of the circle: complex, challenging sounds that never go beyond the framework of understanding. Even the dissonant, atonal becomes euphonious with Mehldau. And the so-called jazz so much to the new classic like no other.

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