During a recent show in Amsterdam the guitarist showed once again why it is great to have him at the festival. Pat Metheny is just a master in creating atmospheric fusion music. Metheny has worked with innumerable musicians in various styles. A short enumeration: Sonny Rollins, Trilok Gurtu, Ornette Coleman, Herbie Hancock, Kenny Garrett, Chick Corea, Abbey Lincoln, Jaco Pastorius, John Scofield and so on and so forth. During a period of more than 20 years, Pat Metheny has made a huge number of albums, both electric and acoustic, one even more brilliant than the next. With his own Pat Metheny Group he won Grammys, but his duets with other top men like Charlie Haden and Jim Hall received the approval of many. Others can't get enough of Metheny in a trio formation, in which guitarist Jaco Pastorius, bass players Charlie Haden, Dave Holland and Larry Grenadier, and drummers Bob Moses, Billy Higgings, Roy Haynes and Bill Stewart took up a position at different points in time. Charlie Haden also belongs to the absolute top of jazz, be it in very different sub-genres. During his long career, 'the poet of the bass' has been of utmost importance for the position of the double bass in jazz. Haden broke through internationally in 1957 as the bass player in the original Ornette Coleman Quartet. He gained a reputation in '69 with his Liberation Music Orchestra, an album characterized by freedom songs like Songs for Che. In 1987 Haden took part in an Ornette Coleman Quartet reunion tour, with whom the album In All Languages was made. The same year the bass player formed his group Charlie Haden Quartet West with the well known West Coast musicians tenor sax player Ernie Watts, pianist Alan Broadbent and drummer Larance Marable, with whom he visited the festival last year. On their beautiful acoustic duet record Beyond the Missouri Sky Haden and Metheny, both from Missouri, went in search of music that goes with their native region. Their interpretation of traditional American music with post-bop elements characterizes the extensive landscapes and gorgeously colored skies, so typical for Missouri. It earned them a Grammy.
