Brad Mehldau - Live In Marciac ★★★★

Rec. 2 August 2006

Solo Mehldau is a very different proposition to the trio in concert. In the late-1990s sometimes while playing alone Mehldau could at times divert into Schumann-like episodes as much as he could tear up a bebop standard or show tune. The levels of intensity then and now can go through the roof, something that, OK, is often intrinsically a feature of a solo piano album good, bad or indifferent. But at this Marciac concert Mehldau was able to offer up a variety of moods alternating the nihilism of grunge and alternative rock interpretations with the likes of the lighter Bobby Timmons’ feelgood number ‘Dat Dere’. It is this spread of music that makes Marciac a more rounded experience than Elegiac Cycle from more than a decade ago, which Mehldau references by revisiting ‘Resignation’ and ‘Trailer Park Ghost’. Fans will wish to compare the then and now, an instructive exercise for sure, in Mehldau’s ever engrossing keyboard journeys.

- Stephen Graham