James Taylor announces new album; tour with Jackson Browne | The Music Universe

Taylor will support the album with a summer tour

James Taylor will release his 19th studio album, American Standard, on CD and LP on February 28th Fantasy Records. The 14 track project was produced by Taylor with Dave O’Donnell and John Pizzarelli, and recorded at Taylor’s Massachusetts home studio. It features a collection of album standards with stripped-down arrangements based on Taylor’s skillful acoustic guitar work rather than piano.

“With some encouragement from my friends at Fantasy Records, I decided to try my hand at an album of standards,” Taylor writes in the album liner notes. “These are songs I have always known. Most of them were part of my family’s record collection, the first music I heard as a kid growing up in North Carolina. We listened to the cast recordings of the great American musicals: Guys and Dolls, Oklahoma!, My Fair Lady, Brigadoon, Peter Pan, Show Boat, South Pacific… Before I started writing my own stuff, I learned to play these tunes, working out chord changes for my favorite melodies. And those guitar arrangements became the basis for this album.”

Taylor will support the album by touring with his All-Star Band and Jackson Browne. The trek kicks off May 15th in New Orleans with stops in Houston, San Francisco, Anaheim, Louisville, Memphis, Nashville and others before wrapping July 10th in Camden, NJ. Full dates are below.