Plus, he’s a great guy to work with and to hang with. I just remembered him as being the quintessential technical guitarist, the one to go to for knowledge about guitar arrangement, and it turned out to be exactly the case. Taylor offered his perspective on their creative process: “John and I put them down as demos essentially and then we liked them so much, they were so well balanced, and he filled them out so perfectly, basically completed what I was playing on the guitar … that it became the basic tracks for that album. With such an idyllic, pastoral scene as the backdrop, it’s no surprise that the album radiates tranquil simplicity. We’d have dinner, and after 90 minutes or so he’d bring the guitar out and we’d play until midnight or whatever.” The two ended up spending many long days and nights together, and their two guitars would end up as the foundation for the sound of the album.
We’d get into the barn around 11 a.m., have a cup of coffee, tell some stories, and then he’d start to play a song he was interested in, and I’d say, ‘That sounds cool.’ We’d make our way into the studio area, play for three hours or so and work it out, and then for three hours we’d record it. I forget what the second tune was, but I started to play with him and then we settled into it. I sat in the booth and every once in a while he’d ask about a chord, and I’d suggest something and he’d try it. The very first day, he sang ‘Old Man River’ by himself. He literally went page by page in a fake book and said, ‘This could be interesting.’ I think he had an idea of what songs he wanted to use. “One day we sat in the barn going through a bunch of tunes. Then I got there and it was just the two of us.” Pizzarelli went up to Taylor’s house in the Berkshires in Massachusetts, where the superstar singer/songwriter has built a barn with a recording studio. “I thought there would be a rhythm section. “When I first got called about it, I didn’t know what he was thinking,” he says. However, the plan wasn’t as clear in Pizzarelli’s mind. That’s why I went to John Pizzarelli.” John Pizzarelli (photo: Brian Saunders) Bass, drums, keyboard, and electric guitar-those are usually what form my basic tracks but, in this case, I wanted to really stick with it as a guitar album. Often I will show that to my band, starting with the keyboard player and the bass. “Basically these songs, like all of my songs, the ones that I write and the ones that I cover, start with my guitar arrangement of the tune. “When I started work on this album I knew, whatever became of it, American Standard was going to start with my arrangements on the guitar of these standards, and I wanted to run them by a really good technical player to basically have an editor for my arrangements,” Taylor explained in an expansive email to JazzTimes. ‘I can’t believe this is happening.’ We spoke after dinner, and he said, ‘I wanna get together and look at songs and see how we can go about it and whenever you can come up, let’s make a plan.’” “James texted me and said, ‘It’s time for me to do an album of standards and you the man,’” Pizzarelli says. He recalls: “James’ assistant had texted me that ‘James wants to get in touch with you and is this a good place?’” Er, well, yes. (Okay, it was actually in Riverside Park in New York, but the Sondheim reference was irresistible given Molaskey’s history with that composer.) The couple got home for dinner and Pizzarelli’s phone was lit up. One afternoon, Pizzarelli and his wife, the noted Broadway singer Jessica Molaskey, had turned off their phones and were on a walk in the woods.
28 on Fantasy Records-and co-produced by Pizzarelli. The finished product, aptly named American Standard, was released on Feb. He didn’t know that Taylor was in the process of planning his latest project: a recording of standards from the Great American Songbook. But, even though he was a lifelong Taylor fan, Pizzarelli naturally assumed those sessions were a one-and-done (or two-and-done) situation. Sure, the jazz guitarist and singer had recorded with Taylor on his October Road and Christmas with James Taylor albums. John Pizzarelli was not expecting a call from James Taylor.
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