Brad Mehldau launches a month-long European tour starting with a five-show run of performances with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, followed by an 11-city tour with the Brad Mehldau Trio. The Orpheus tour, featuring the premiere of a new piece by Mehldau, kicks off with a performance in Moscow, followed by stops in Berlin, Munich, Dusseldorf, and Vienna. Mehldau then meets up with his Trio for a set at Barbican Hall for the London Jazz Festival, followed by shows in Italy, Germany, France, Sweden, Spain, Switzerland, and Turkey.

The Brad Mehldau Trio’s new album, Where Do You Start, a companion disc to this spring’s critically acclaimed Ode, is out now. The new album, featuring interpretations of ten tunes by other composers plus one Mehldau original, earns four stars from the Guardian, Independent on Sunday, Times of London, and Daily Telegraph, and five stars from the Financial Times, which says the Trio gives "an adventurous sheen to modern jazz." NPR's Fresh Air says: "The pianist builds his improvisation like a master storyteller." The BBC finds Mehldau "entering a new prime phase in his career."

Nonesuch releases the Brad Mehldau Trio’s Where Do You Start, a companion disc to this spring’s critically acclaimed Ode, on September 18, 2012. Whereas Ode featured 11 songs composed by Mehldau, Where Do You Start comprises the Trio’s interpretations of ten tunes by other composers, along with one Mehldau original. Where Do You Start is available for pre-order now in the Nonesuch Store, where an instant download of the album's Mehldau track, “Jam,” is included with purchase.

The North Sea Jazz Festival takes place this weekend in Rotterdam, Netherlands, featuring a diverse array of artists, including several familiar to readers of the Nonesuch Journal: Joshua Redman, James Farm, Pat Metheny, Brad Mehldau Trio, Punch Brothers, Lianne La Havas, Fatoumata Diawara, and Oumou Sangare. Redman, in fact, is this year's North Sea Jazz Artist in Residence and as such performs on each festival day with varied musical projects.

The Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA, formerly UCLA Live, has announced its inaugural season, marking the curatorial debut of its Executive and Artistic Director Kristy Edmunds, and featured among the artists performing as part of its 2012–13 season of events at Royce Hall are several artists familiar to readers of the Nonesuch Journal: Emmylou Harris, Laurie Anderson, Allen Toussaint, the Brad Mehldau Trio, and Joshua Redman. The new season also includes events celebrating Kate McGarrigle and Ali Farka Touré.

The Brad Mehldau Trio has landed in California, kicking off a string of Bay Area shows in Santa Cruz last night, followed by a set in Napa tonight and three shows in San Francisco this weekend for SFJAZZ. The San Jose Mercury News calls last night's show "transfixing ... total exquisiteness." All About Jazz says the Trio's new album, Ode, is "rich, lyrical and full of energy ... a non-stop stream of invention." The Montreal Gazette says: "This may well be [Mehldau's] most interesting, absorbing album to date." The Philadelphia Inquirer calls it "transformative." Blurt says it's "some of the trio's most fiery interplay to date. A most welcome return."

The Brad Mehldau Trio’s new album, Ode, with 11 previously unreleased songs composed by Mehldau, is out now. The album is "full of seductive melody, and in its blues and bop references and surging swing, it's explicitly jazzy, too," says the Guardian in a four-star review. "It bears a lot of replaying." The Observer calls the new songs "absorbing," noting that "Mehldau is so brilliant at 'recomposing' standards that his remarkable talent as a composer is often overlooked." The Ottawa Citizen says: "A potent combination of deep lyricism, questing creativity and bar-raising virtuosity, Ode consistently provides the frissons that Mehldau fans have come to expect and that lesser pianists wish they could evoke."

The Brad Mehldau Trio returns with Ode, out this week in the UK and this coming Tuesday in North America. Ode earns five-stars from the Daily Telegraph, which says it "shows his inventive powers are as fresh as ever," and the Financial Times, which calls it "benchmark piano-trio jazz." The BBC raves: "All three players are articulating a ceaseless stream of fresh ideas throughout this electrically energised session." MusicOMH calls it "an often scintillating and always joyful listen from beginning to end." Early US reviews agree. The New York Times finds "resonant lyricism, floating locomotion, a harmonic approach that brings depth to simple structures and sleekness to the more complex ones." The Chicago Tribune hears Mehldau "in prime form as composer, improviser and bandleader."

Brad Mehldau is set to perform an intimate solo set in Washington, DC, this weekend. The Washington City Paper says: "His performances are wondrous, and this one promises to be no different." The Washington Post, reviewing the new Brad Mehldau Trio box set The Art of the Trio Recordings: 1996-2001, cites "an intuitive and highly interactive level of performance" in the set. JazzTimes says the retrospective offers "a fresh vantage point on a body of music by enabling the listener to experience it whole. The best art requires time to release all of its revelations." Jambands calls it "a solid reminder why Brad Mehldau has earned his place amongst the true masters of the jazz piano."

Brad Mehldau joins his Trio—featuring bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jeff Ballard—for a six-night residency at NYC's famed Village Vanguard, starting tonight. "[T]his iteration of his pace-setting trio," says the New York Times, "has evolved into a graceful powerhouse, equally savvy about groove and harmony. There’s still no better place to hear the band than the Village Vanguard, a special room for Mr. Mehldau and for his devoted base." The BBC, reviewing the newly released Art of the Trio Recordings box set, says of Mehldau: "It is his genius, his dash of daring, his exceptional touch, and his ability to conceive a performance lasting over several minutes as a compositional entity that mark him out."

The Brad Mehldau Trio’s seven-disc box set The Art of the Trio Recordings: 1996–2001, featuring longtime Brad Mehldau Trio bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jorge Rossy, earns four stars in the Guardian, which says "the trio created a private world for their listeners to get lost in, and this is the definitive representation of it." The review cites the trio's "almost telepathic intuitiveness" that led to a "mind-boggling" performance. The Financial Times gives it four stars as well, saying it "documents Mehldau’s virtuosity" and confirms "this trio as both yardstick and model for contemporary piano jazz." The Buffalo News calls the set "indisputably great." KPCC says: "Mehldau makes renegade jazz, and this comprehensive collection shows him at his finest."