Pale Blue Dot by Cochran and McAllister Duo

Pale Blue Dot
Cochran and McAllister Duo
Sacred Black Records, 2024

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Great to hear the new album by Matthew Cochran and Matthew McAllister featuring music by Matthew Cochran, Pat Metheny, Ralph Towner, Chick Corea, and Hans Zimmer. The album begins with a beautiful five movement duo composition by Cochran inspired by space and time. The work features a wide variety of textures from melodic exchanges, intricate kaleidoscopic grooves, to spacious mediations. The arrangements of fusion jazz classics fit nicely on the album with my personal favourite being Metheny’s Letter from Home. The album ends with Hans Zimmer’s Interstellar Suite based on the music written for the movie Interstellar. Great playing throughout the album with both virtuosic ensemble performances but always sounding musical, natural, and well settled. The recording quality is also very nice with a warm glowing sound and enough clarity for good separation. Go take a listen or check out the live performances below.

Album Description

Classical Guitar Duo Cochran & McAllister went big for their new album Pale Blue Dot. The guitar virtuosos drew inspiration from space, from time, and from the writings of beloved astronomer Carl Sagan.  “We wanted to make a record that follows a narrative,” explains Scottish guitarist Matthew McAllister, “Carl Sagan’s famous presentation about a photo taken from the Voyager II satellite in which the Earth is a tiny little speck in an enormous galaxy…we just found that to be a humbling and inspiring concept.”  American composer-guitarist Matthew Cochran turned that inspiration into a large-scale suite for two guitars, appropriately titled Pale Blue Dot. Cochran also contributed a series of ambitious and highly original arrangements by legendary jazz composers Chick Corea, Pat Metheny and Ralph Towner. The project concludes with the duo’s stunning performance of a suite from Hans Zimmer’s ephemeral score from the Christopher Nolan epic, Interstellar.

Track Listing

• Pale Blue Dot by Matthew Cochran
  • You Are Here
  • Voyager
  • Sacred Black
  • Routine Interplanetary Violence
  • Aberrations of Light
• Letter from Home by Pat Metheny (arr. Cochran)
• Icarus by Ralph Towner (arr. Cochran)
• Spain by Chick Corea (arr. Cochran)
• Interstellar Suite by Hans Zimmer (arr. Versluys, McAllister & Cochran)

Live Performances of the Repertoire via McAllister’s Youtube channel.