I'm Retired! Now what?

While surviving high school and college back in the 1980’s I saw plenty of people strutting around the classrooms wearing concert shirts that ranged from the Little River Band to Aerosmith.  Back in those days this was kind of a universal badge of honor that simply stated, “I’m cool and you’re not.”  And of course, I’m talking about those classic concert shirts.  The ones that had those uneven tails that dropped down around your hips with the weird sleeves that stretched down to the middle of your forearm.  These were the shirts that looked like something your little sister might have sewed together in her home economics class.  Regardless what crappy quality these shirts might have been back then, I always wanted one, but I never had the money or the guts to take on the concert experience back in my teen years.  However, all that changed once I got a decent job and moved to North Texas.

Once I moved to the Lone Star State, I learned that pretty much any band worthy of making your ears rings plays somewhere in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area, and I’ve spent the last 37 years trying to prove such a belief by taking in as many concerts as possible.  I once made the claim that I was going to stop going to shows after I turned fifty years old, but that was pushed on to sixty because there were still a few artists I hadn’t seen.  And now at the age of sixty-two, I just can’t seem to give up my addiction to live music or my obsession with writing about it.

I guess the first concert I wrote about was an Asia concert I saw at the Dallas House of Blues in 2010.  I can’t remember when I started posting my concert reviews on Facebook, but I have a bit of a following.  I guess I provide a service for those music fans who want to partake in the concert experience but still value their hearing.

Indeed, I’m pretty much up for any kind of music that’s live and jazz is no exception.  So when jazz guitarist Pat Metheny came to Dallas, I decided to make his performance my FIRST retirement concert, and this is my review of the Pat Metheny Group playing at the Majestic Theater in Dallas, Texas. 

THE PATMETHENY GROUP, MAJESTIC THEATER, DALLAS TEXAS, APRIL 1, 2026

The last time I took a seat in the Majestic Theater in Dallas, Texas I was watching the great Tommy Emmanuel do amazing and illustrious things with an acoustic guitar.  Well, this last Wednesday I returned to watch one of the jazz guitar greats, Pat Metheny!  I use the word “great” because Pat falls into the top ten in every “Greatest Jazz Guitarist” list I could find.  Pat has been on my concert bucket list for a while now, and after seeing most of the guitar gods of classic rock over the years, I was pretty stoked to finally get a chance to see a little of Metheny’s magic.  I first started getting into jazz back in college mostly because it was just such great background music for homework.  Lots of cool music with no lyrics, and I have to admit I felt like I needed to pull out one of my old college textbooks when Pat started flowing through the tunes.  And I do mean flowing!  The way that guy plays seem so effortless I just have to wonder what kind of supernatural powers he possesses.  Did he make a deal with the devil like bluesman Robert Johnson?  Indeed not, because this music sounded way more heavenly.

Much to my surprise, the band took the stage by marching through the audience.  This was my first Metheny concert, but those around me seemed to act like the entry was just the normal way a Metheny show begins.  Indeed, there were plenty of hardcore Metheny fans on hand, and even though Pat brought a few new tunes with him, the theater erupted in applause when the guitar master launched into the familiar tunes.  The problem with shows like this is the fact that no one can sing along unless someone wants to sing along with the guitar.  Of course that could prove to be a challenge considering the way Pat was changing his effects and ripping through those notes with a skill that would win the respect of any heavy metal shredder.

Those who packed the theater for the evening consisted of a pretty diverse crowd.  As expected, I saw plenty of folks that looked like they were around for Pat’s first albums, way back in the late 1970’s, but there were a few kiddos on hand as well.  And like all jazz concerts, the serious musicians were well represented.  One guy near me was carrying on about his musical graduate work in college.

Regardless of what my ticket said, Pat Metheny wasn’t the only star on the stage, and there were a few times when I thought that Pat and his keyboard player might be battling each other for musical supremacy.  For my money, the guy sitting at the keys was every bit as impressive as Mr. Metheny himself!  I’m not sure how many keyboards the guy had packed in around him, but he looked as if he might have to be lowered into his seat by a stage crane.  With that extensive musical setup, I had to feel a bit sorry for his tech/roadie.

Because there were very few vocals going on, we all felt the need to break out into applause after every solo.  So we all applauded the masterful guitar solos which were followed by the killer drum solos along with those amazing bass solos and the celestial keyboard solos.  A devoted fan could develop carpal tunnel from clapping for all those random solos!  But that’s just life at a jazz concert.  What has always baffled me about jazz is the question concerning how do these guys name their songs?  With no words, what is a song title based on?  Could a song just be called, Prelude to A Bass Solo?  Drum Solo Concerto with Snare?  Regardless of the song’s names, there was plenty of serious talent to be heard on that stage, and Pat wasn’t going anywhere until he was convinced that we all got our money’s worth.  With a show that lasted nearly two and a half hours, the guitar master dished out enough amazing tunes to hold us until the next time he comes to town.