Jazz breaking news: Anne Sofie von Otter and Brad Mehldau To Release 2-CD Album Love Songs
Monday, September 27, 2010
Brad Mehldau returns with the release of a new collaboration, for the first time on a recording, with the famed Swedish mezzo soprano Anne Sofie von Otter who has recently been playing the role of Brangäne in Peter Sellars’ production of Tristan and Isolde.
The pair have performed together in concert at Carnegie Hall in New York and at the Wigmore Hall in London.
Released on the French classical and jazz label Naïve, the 2-CD set titled Love Songs features on the first disc a deeply contemplative series of seven duets with music and lyrics by Mehldau based on the poems of Sara Teasdale, who published Love Songs in 1918.
The second disc has 13 songs by a range of writers including Léo Ferré, Joni Mitchell, Michel Legrand, and John Lennon / Paul McCartney. With chanson, show tunes and pop songs the album can be seen as a further development in Mehldau’s work with singers following the album Love Sublime with soprano Renée Fleming released four years ago.
Love Songs is released next month and the pair will appear in concert together in Prague and Cologne at the end of October before Mehldau’s Highway Rider tour begins in the States. Highway Rider debuts for the first time in Europe at the Barbican Centre on 13 November during the London Jazz Festival.
– Stephen Graham