Lee Ritenour Announces Live at Ronnie Scott’s, Revisits “Is It You?”

The guitarist’s new live album arrives October 23, with a Brazilian-inflected reinvention of his 1981 crossover hit serving as its first single.

Lee Ritenour will release Live at Ronnie Scott’s on October 23, 2026, through The Players Club/Artone Label Group. Recorded during an eight-show March residency at London’s legendary jazz club, the album captures the Grammy-winning guitarist revisiting five decades of music with a young, road-tested band.

The first single is a newly arranged live version of “Is It You?,” Ritenour’s signature vocal hit from the 1981 album Rit. The original recording, featuring lead vocalist Eric Tagg, reached No. 15 on both Billboard’s Hot 100 and Adult Contemporary charts and No. 27 on the soul chart. Ritenour co-wrote the song with Tagg and Bill Champlin.

More than four decades later, Ritenour has not attempted to reproduce that studio recording note for note. He says the song has “definitely evolved” and acknowledges that it was never particularly easy for a band to perform live.

The new version takes on a gentler, slower groove, with Brazilian musicians Munir Hossn and Tatiana Parra sharing the vocals. Hossn also plays bass in Ritenour’s band.

Ritenour recalls sending the song to Hossn about a year before the recording. The younger musician did not know the early-’80s hit well and had one surprising reservation: although he had sung in Portuguese, French and Spanish, he had never performed a song in English.

Ritenour decided that neither singer needed to disguise their natural phrasing or accents. That decision helped give the familiar song its new personality, and he says he is “very happy” with the result.

A Band Built for the Moment

Along with Hossn and Parra, the musicians joining Ritenour on Live at Ronnie Scott’s are keyboardist Giorgi Mikadze, harmonica virtuoso Grégoire Maret, and drummer Wes Ritenour, Lee’s son.

According to Ritenour, the group’s recent history together was essential to the recording. Rather than assembling solely for the album, the musicians arrived in London after several years of consistent playing. That familiarity allowed the band to reshape well-known material instead of simply reproducing the recorded arrangements.

The residency consisted of eight performances with changing set lists—a suitably expansive approach for an artist whose catalog moves freely among jazz fusion, Brazilian music, pop, funk and straight-ahead jazz.

The resulting album includes staples such as “Captain Fingers,” “A Little Bumpin’,” “L.A. By Bike” and “The Village,” alongside Brazilian favorites including “Cravo e Canela,” “Meu Samba Torto” and Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “Stone Flower.”

Back at Ronnie’s

Ritenour’s connection with Ronnie Scott’s reaches back to the 1970s, and his album announcement makes clear that the venue was more than a picturesque location for the recording.

“Ronnie Scott’s has always been a special place for me. The history, the room and the audience create an energy unlike anywhere else.”

That energy met a band prepared to take advantage of it.

“This band came into the shows ready to play, and I’m very proud of what we captured together,” Ritenour said.

The club’s musical openness also mirrors Ritenour’s own career.

“Every type of music has been played at Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club since 1959,” Ritenour said. “That’s exactly what I love to do too.”

Since opening, Ronnie Scott’s has hosted defining jazz figures including Wes Montgomery, Miles Davis and Nina Simone while also welcoming rock, blues, soul and crossover artists. Ritenour’s own résumé has followed a similarly unrestricted path.

He emerged as an elite Los Angeles session guitarist in the late 1960s and went on to record with artists ranging from Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett and B.B. King to Steely Dan, Quincy Jones and Pink Floyd. As a solo artist, he became one of jazz fusion’s most recognizable guitar voices, explored Brazilian music extensively and later co-founded Fourplay with Bob James, Nathan East and Harvey Mason.

On Live at Ronnie Scott’s, all of those musical identities meet in the same room. It’s not a retrospective museum piece, but as living material open to reinterpretation.

Live at Ronnie Scott’s Track List

1. Cravo e Canela
2. L.A. By Bike
3. For the Palms
4. Captain Fingers
5. A Little Bumpin’
6. Meu Samba Torto
7. Lay It Down
8. Is It You?
9. Waltz for Carmen
10. Stone Flower
11. Pearl
12. The Village

Live at Ronnie Scott’s will be available October 23 on CD, vinyl and digital platforms. “Is It You? (Live at Ronnie Scott’s)” is available now as the album’s first single.

More information: View the official album announcement and preorder information.