Pat Metheny - Orchestrion (2010)

Metheny is the only live musician on this recording, but its the opposite of, say, his 2003 One Quiet Night, in which Metheny hunkered down in his home studio to explore all the musical possibilities of one new guitar. Here he works with an extraordinary set-up of acoustic instruments, assembled for him by a visionary team of inventors. What they have created in collaboration with Metheny is a veritable made-to-order solenoid orchestra that includes, among other things, bass, pianos, percussion, marimbas, guitar-bots, and a mellifluous cabinet of carefully tuned bottles. Using one-of-a-kind software programs and solenoid switches, Metheny controls each instrument via his guitar and an array of pedals. Orchestrionics is what Metheny calls this new method of performing. The resulting album, recorded in midtown Manhattan's MSR studio after months of experimentation at home, is a marvel of the digital era, yet the record sounds beautifully, stirringly, human. In other words, timeless.

Listen to samples on Amazon

Pat Metheny Takes Viewers Behi...rchestrion" in Short Film

Tracklist

01. Orchestrion (15:48)
02. Entry Point (10:28)
03. Expansion (8:35)
04. Soul Search (9:19)
05. Spirit of the Air (7:45)