Pat Metheny - Selected Recordings :rarum IX (2004)

ECM :rarum MONTH* (MARCH 2017)

Metheny may be the ECM label's most renown artist here in the US - the only person that could challenge that claim is possibly Keith Jarrett. He left the ECM label in the mid-80s. The guitarist picked out a top-notch collection of folky jazz fusion tunes from his early years. Excellent detailed liner notes about each song written by Metheny himself. Recommended.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: Did not chart

Tracks: 9 tracks, 72 minutes. (I could easily put a ✔ by all the tracks, so I'm being very selective with my praise today).

Title	Album	Year
Bright Size Life	Bright Size Life	1976
Phase Dance	Pat Metheny Group	1978	✔
New Chautauqua	New Chautauqua	1979
Airstream	American Garage	1979
Every Day (I Thank You)	80/81	1980
"It's For You"	As Falls Wichita...	1981	✔
Are You Going With Me?	Travels	1983	✔
The First Circle	First Circle	1984	✔
Lonely Woman	Rejoicing	1984

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: My first experience with Metheny was ordering Offramp from the Columbia House record club when I was in high school. I wasn't quite ready for that music then, but by the time First Circle was released a few years later, I grabbed on with both hands. When Metheny and Ornette Coleman collaborated on the free jazz Song X album in 1986, he lost me again. I've never caught back up with Metheny since and I blame myself for that. So I'm stuck with his early releases and I'm okay with that because just listen to them.

Previously revisited for the blog:
Steve Reich - Different Trains, Electric Counterpoint (1989)
The Falcon And The Snowman Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1985)
First Circle (1984)
Offramp (1982)

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*Back in June 2015, this beautiful thing showed up at my doorstep:

It's a 12 CD box set (2008) of compilation discs from ECM's :rarum series, a birthday gift from a good friend.  In this series, the artists were given the freedom to pick their personal favorite recordings from any ECM release they've made as a leader or sideman. In other words, the label got outta the way and good for them.  I'll be making my way through the set this month.

ECM (Edition of Contemporary Music), originally a German label, was founded in 1969. "Rarum" comes from the Latin root "rarus" meaning "rare" (perhaps foreshadowing that these CDs wouldn't be in print for very long).