Jazz breaking news: Keith Jarrett / Charlie Haden album set for May release

The duo recording is Jarrett’s first studio album since 1999’s The Melody at Night, With You; it is also his first recording with the double bassist since the 1976 break-up of their “American Quartet” with Paul Motian and Dewey Redman.

The new collaboration came about in 2007, after Jarrett and Haden were reunited when the pianist contributed to Reto Caduff’s documentary Charlie Haden: Rambling Boy. The album was recorded in March of that year, over four days at Jarrett’s home studio in New Jersey. ECM’s Steve Lake suggests that “the overall feel and atmosphere is perhaps closer to Jarrett’s solo Melody At Night… than anything else in his discography.”

That earlier album also included a version of Kern and Hammerstein’s ‘Don’t Ever Leave Me’, which closes Jasmine. The eight tracks are mostly love songs from the standards book, though one notable surprise comes in the form of ‘One Day I’ll Fly Away’, as made famous by Randy Crawford.

The 64-year-old Jarrett has recently attracted criticism for his tirades against coughing audience members at his solo concerts. The San Jose Mercury News laid into what they called his “Larry David routine” at San Francisco’s Davies Symphony Hall on Friday. Jarrett will doubtless be pleased that Jasmine is, at the very least, cough-free.

– Edward Randell