Lori Mechem: News

Just wanted to let everyone know that the Basie 2 cd is underway. We have 9 tunes already recorded and looking to finish rhythm tracks at the end of July. Than, in September Pete Christlieb will be visiting and guest on 5 of the tunes. Very excited about this!!! The title of the cd will be "April in Paril". Brian Parker will be doing the artwork again which will be fabulous. Once we get Pete on, we will mix and i will have this cd for a December/January release. Stay tuned.

So many of you have asked for me to do a 2nd Basie cd. The project is planned for April 14 and 15th 08. We will record probably half of the cd, mostly because it is physically so hard that I can't finish it in a few days.
I am really excited to play some of Basie's greatest hits and a few chestnuts too. This is the 2nd tribute cd i have done of Basie tunes.
Of course this will be with my quartet featuring Chris Brown, Andy Reiss, Roger Spencer and special guest Pete Christlieb. Looking forward to this project.
Hope you will too!!

Hi Everyone,
Just wanted to let you know that i am getting ready for another cd release of my solo piano meditation cd. This is something that has been in the works for a long time. The cd release is Sunday, January 6th at 4pm at the Nashville Jazz Workshop.
The cd is all originals, alot that i wrote many years ago and a few that is brand new.

Just wanted to let everyone know that the Pete Christlieb and Lori Mechem Quartet cd is now 23 on the charts! This is only just a week of airplay. So we will probably continue to climb each day. YEA!!!
Very excited about this. Looks like I have to re-order the Shiny Stockings cd...i only have 50 left. We the Pete cd selling, we will surely get other sales from this

I am releasing my 4th cd on October 15th. It is my quartet, Andy Reiss, Roger Spencer and Chris Brown, featuring the great saxophonist, Pete Christlieb. It was recorded live at the Nashville Jazz Workshop in the Cave. Tom Knox did such a great mix on the cd, it just sounds great!
It's such a hard thing to get a good mix in a live setting, but between him and Jeff Hall helping, it really turned out great. We will have a little celebration Oct. 15th and Pete will be coming in from L.A. to hang and play a set with us. We will start radio promo in January because it is the right timing to do that. So, we hope to see you at the release party, it will be a swinging night!!!

OK... so another busy month. Our Fall Fundraiser was a big success and was very fun. All in the same week, I moved my parents in their new place 2 blocks away from the Workshop and had student performances that whole week. Our family also came in for the event, so we were really slammed. By the time we got done with everything, we both got colds. That totally sucked!!!
Now we are getting ready for our cd release party on October 15th. We are really looking forward to this.

The Jazz Workshop just had a break for 2 weeks and it was really good for us. It is good for us to just rest our minds for a while. I have to do that so that I am charged up to be able to finish out the year. We are now mixing our Pete Christleib cd that we recorded in April. Everyone has been so busy that we haven't go tten a chance to really work on it. Tom Knox is mixing for us and Brian Parker is doing the artwork. Can't wait to get it out, hopefully in September.

These months are going by so fast, I can't believe it. May has tamed down a little for the Jazz Workshop but not really for me. We have been planning for our build-out of the new space we are about to take at the Jazz Workshop. That takes a lot of patience and time, thanks to our board member Skip Lawrence, who will be doing the build-out. On May 19th, I will be auditioning for the Tennessee Arts Commission for a $5,000 grant. May 26th and 27th, Kevin Mahogany will be coming to the Workshop and I will be playing with him. Looking forward to that.

I have been really busy this month and very excited about the people that I have gotten to play with. On April 8th, we had our annual Jazz at the Workshop and performed with jazz legends Ed Thigpen and Houston Person. What an honor it was to play with these guys! It felt so cool sitting across from Ed Thigpen. It was also very cool to play with Houston. He plays ballads so well, makes the girls scream!

On April 18th and 19th, I did a "live" recording in the Cave with Pete Christleib and my quartet. This was really alot of fun and I think we will have a very nice cd hopefully ready by summer.
That weekend, I performed with Kirk Whalum at NJW. He is so wonderful and everyone loved it.
The week of April 24th, we started new classes at the Workshop. So it has been a busy April.