Control · Fall 2026Page 70 of 100.THE REVIEW
A close view of piano keys receding out of focus toward a bright window.
A piano keyboard recedes into soft focus toward a bright window. Brad Mehldau reads Elliott Smith’s songs with obvious devotion, though the arrangements sometimes crowd them.The photograph is by George Becker on Pexels.

Review

Elliott Smith’s songs are too fragile for this much furniture.

On Ride into the Sun, the jazz pianist Brad Mehldau arranges the songs of Elliott Smith for band and orchestra, with mixed results.

Written by CONTROL

This article runs 421 words and takes about two minutes to read.

6out of 10
Album
Ride into the Sun
By
Brad Mehldau
From
Nonesuch Records, 2025

Elliott Smith wrote songs that sound as though they were meant to be overheard. His best recordings are close, double-tracked murmurs, and their power comes from how little is on them. Brad Mehldau, the jazz pianist who has long turned pop and rock songs, from Radiohead to the Beatles, into material for improvisation, understands this better than most. That is what makes Ride into the Sun such a puzzling record.

Released by Nonesuch in August 2025 and recorded over five days that January, the album gathers ten Smith songs, covers of Big Star’s “Thirteen” and Nick Drake’s “Sunday,” and four Mehldau originals written in Smith’s shadow. The band includes the drummer Matt Chamberlain and the bassists John Davis and Felix Moseholm. Daniel Rossen of Grizzly Bear and the mandolinist Chris Thile sing on a few tracks, and a chamber orchestra is conducted by Dan Coleman, who also produced the record with Mehldau.

An upright piano with its front panel removed shows hammers and strings beside a round stool.
An upright piano with its front removed shows its hammers and strings. Smith’s songs worked on that scale, one voice and very little between it and the listener.The photograph is by Pavel Danilyuk on Pexels.
A white grand piano stands in a dark, sparsely furnished room beside glass tables.
A white grand piano sits in a spare dark room. Mehldau adds band and orchestra to songs that were written for one man and a quiet room.The photograph is by Anton on Pexels.

The problem of the strings

The orchestra is where the album goes astray. Smith loved the Beatles and dressed some of his later songs in strings and horns, so the impulse is defensible in principle. But the arrangements here tend to underline what the songs already say, swelling where Smith would have held back, and they turn private confessions into something closer to a film score. Songs this delicate can survive a great deal, but they do not need this much help.

The small-group performances are better. When the orchestra falls away and Mehldau is left with piano, bass and drums, the songs open up without losing their shape, and his gift for finding a second melody inside a familiar one comes through. Rossen’s voice suits the material, and Thile sings “Colorbars,” the late Smith song that gives the album its title, with a warmth that feels earned.

Mehldau’s four originals, including a title suite in two parts, are thoughtful and well made, but they sit oddly beside Smith’s songs. At nearly seventy-three minutes, the album is long enough that they register as detours rather than as dialogue. A tribute this reverent would have been stronger at half the length.

There is real love in this project, and none of it is cynical. Smith died in 2003, and the urge to give his songs a grander setting than he ever had is understandable. The songs simply did not ask for one.

The verdict: this is a sincere, handsomely played tribute that smothers what it loves. Mehldau’s admirers should listen selectively, and Smith’s admirers should go back to the originals.