Paul Cornish Trio at The Side Door

Every artist who records for Blue Note is part of a grand legacy, now in its 86th year. But pianist Paul Cornish is a torchbearer for several remarkable Blue Note legacies, all at once. Which makes You’re Exaggerating!, his powerfully lyrical trio debut for the label, a mission statement for Blue Note’s next generation.

To begin, Cornish is part of a great heritage of jazz piano that has unfolded at the label, from Blue Note’s first 78-rpm releases by Meade Lux Lewis and Albert Ammons through Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk, Horace Silver, Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner, Andrew Hill, Don Pullen, Geri Allen, Jacky Terrasson, Gonzalo Rubalcaba, Renee Rosnes, Aaron Parks, Gerald Clayton and beyond.

Then, he’s part of a lineage of Blue Note artists, past and present, who hail from Houston, Texas, and developed at the city’s Kinder High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, a.k.a. HSPVA. That more recent hall of fame includes Jason Moran, Robert Glasper, Walter Smith III, Kendrick Scott, Chris Dave and James Francies. Of course, within that list there’s yet another bloodline, of musicians who’ve come to define jazz pianism in the 21st century: Moran, Glasper, Francies and, now, Cornish, who was born and raised in Houston and has been based in Los Angeles for over a decade.