I was a guest of vocalist Silje Nergaard when she recorded A Thousand True Stories in 2008 with the Metropole Orkest, arranged and conducted by Vince Mendoza, and was also present at Mendoza's recording of Blauklang when he conducted his own compositions for the WDR Jazz Orchestra in Cologne the same year.

Seeing a master craftsman at work with two large ensembles, in two different countries, and how he brought his musical vision alive through the power of his personality was an education in itself – he's not at the top of the tree for nothing; something Olympians underlines in dayglo. From 2005 to 2013 he was chief conductor of the Metropole Orkest, with whom he maintains close ties. It's an orchestra he has arranged and conducted music for countless times for their guest artists, but now he finally gets to play his own music. His writing for large ensembles is part antiphonal and part written across whole sections, and is always in a state of becoming, using the storytelling privilege of the composer to embark on a musical journey that is always implying movement towards a musical destination. The Metropole may be a large orchestra, but in Mendoza's hands never unwieldy. Dianne Reeves on ‘Esperanto,’ the only non-Mendoza composition on the album, demonstrates the true jazz diva she has become, while Cécile McLorin Salvant's beguiling charm is framed perfectly by Mendoza on ‘House of Reflections.’