Another one gone to great gig in the sky. The Pat Metheny Group have been one of ‘my bands’ since the late 70’s and Lyle has been a fixture for most of that time. A really wonderful and sensitive pianist, all round keyboardist and composer. My favourite album of theirs and probably one of my all time Top 20 albums is ‘As Falls Wichita So Falls Wichita Falls’ and this track which is an homage to Bill Evans also works as an homage for Lyle. This is the only vs of that tune – sound is ok but visuals a bit poor. But give the album a ‘spin’ if you don’t know it.
Lyle Mays RIP
Very sad, I loved his synth stuff with Metheny such as “Offramp”. Wonderful.
Very sad to hear that. Only 66 years old.
The Pat Metheny Group at the height of their powers were quite extraordinary.
Sad news. I saw him quite a few times with Pat Metheny. Lyle’s first eponymous solo album is extremely good, do check it out if you enjoyed Offramp and As Falls Wichita.
A friend of mine in Philadelphia just made this comment.
“One of the most singular, original, and gifted musicians of my generation. How many hours of purest joy did his explorations give us?”
And posted this song.
I cannot think of any band that has ever sounded remotely like them.
That clip must be from late 70’s but typifies the melodic style that developed over the decades. Metheny without Mays would often go in different and sometimes way out directions and not always successfully. Together they created this lovely combination of melody plus chops but often with a melancholic ache that pervades much of their best stuff. I think the last album they did together is ‘The Way Up’ from 2005 and it’s one of their best. Others I’d recommend would be ‘Secret Story’ (ostensibly a PM solo but Lyall plays on it), ‘First Circle’, ‘Offramp’ and ‘American Garage’. The Wichita album though remains my favourite and is unlike anything else that they did – a combination of gorgeous ambience (Side 1) and acoustic based tunefulness (Side 2)