Pat Metheny | Side-Eye III+ JazzNights 2026

In the organizer's words:

20-time Grammy award-winning guitar legend on the road with new album "Side-Eye III+" first major studio release in six years
On tour at JazzNights in June 2026

Pat Metheny has been one of the most influential guitarists in modern jazz for decades - a truly exceptional musician who combines technical mastery, inexhaustible curiosity and powerful expression like no other. In June 2026, the multi-award-winning artist will be coming to Germany for a series of selected JazzNights concerts, stopping off in Flensburg, Lübeck, Hamburg, Berlin, Munich, Dortmund, Freiburg, Nuremberg and Frankfurt.

At the center of these shows is Pat Metheny's new album "Side-Eye III+", his first studio album in six years. For this album, he has expanded his core line-up, consisting of himself, Chris Fishman (piano/keyboards) and Joe Dyson (drums), to include bassist Jermaine Patton and percussionist and singer Leonard Patton. For Metheny, this five-piece line-up represents a glimpse into the future of his Side-Eye project. As the result of "Side-Eye III+" recorded in the studio cannot be satisfactorily reproduced in the trio format, he gratefully accepted the challenge of finding other approaches to the new material. Metheny fans know how much creative energy this unleashes in him, so his live audience can look forward to some truly great moments!

The album will be released on Uniquity Music, Pat Metheny's own record label, with which he is fulfilling his long-cherished dream of a label home that unites all his past and future works under one roof. In addition to all future releases, reissues of all his albums from 1984 onwards will also appear here.
Born in Lee's Summit, Missouri, Metheny discovered his love of music at an early age. He began playing the trumpet at the age of eight, but switched to the guitar at twelve - the instrument that would shape his life. By the age of 15, he was already performing regularly with the best jazz musicians in Kansas City, where he developed a musical maturity that went far beyond his age.

Metheny celebrated his international breakthrough in 1974 alongside vibraphonist Gary Burton. Even then, the individual style that makes him unmistakable to this day began to emerge: flexible, almost vocal articulation, a modern improvisational approach that nevertheless remains deeply rooted in jazz, as well as an extraordinary rhythmic and harmonic sense. With his debut album "Bright Size Life" (1975), he fundamentally renewed the sound of the jazz guitar and inspired an entire generation of young musicians.