Pianist Brad Mehldau’s meteoric rise to the top of today’s Jazz piano hierarchy is nothing short of staggering. Winner of the 1998 'DownBeat' Critics Poll in the Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition category for both acoustic piano and acoustic Jazz group, Brad was also selected in their Readers’ Poll as Best New Artist in the same year. Nominated for a Grammy in 1997, his trio (with bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jorge Rossy), combines complex harmonies, shifting time signatures and melodic ingenuity in their approach to both originals and standards.
Mehldau was raised in Hartford, Connecticut, and pursued music since early childhood, tinkering with the piano at four and starting formal lessons at six. As a high school junior he was named Best All Around Musician at the prestigious Berklee College’s annual High School Competition.
Continuing his studies at New York’s New School For Social Research’s Jazz Program, he studied with pianists Fred Hersch, Junior Mance and Kenny Werner, as well as master drummer Jimmy Cobb, with whom he ended up playing as a sideman in Cobb’s Mob.
While his own trio has been together since 1992, Mehldau has also
continued to work as a sideman with a prominent array of diverse artists and situations like Joshua Redman’s quartet, country legend Willie Nelson and on the soundtrack for Clint Eastwood’s 'Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.'
Enjoying a long relationship with Warner Brothers Records, Mehldau continues to perform in clubs, concert halls and major festivals all over the U.S. and overseas.
