The Copley Square area in Boston had an active Jazz scene in the '70s.  Two of the jazz clubs, The Jazz Workshop, and the adjacent Paul's Mall (the site of Weather Reports first shows), were both owned by local jazz impresario Fred Taylor.  

Also in the area was the Berklee College of Music.  In nearby Kenmore Square was Pooh's Pub.  Two miles north of Boston in Somerville Massachusetts was the Zircon Club.

Pat Metheny had played with drummer Bob Moses in the Gary Burton Band.  Metheny met Jaco while in Florida, studying at the University of Miami, where Jaco was teaching at the time.  They also both played with the Peter Graves Orchestra in the early 70's. 

Metheny had been studying at Berklee in Boston, and he brought Moses and Jaco there to play in a trio at the local jazz clubs.  They played on and off throughout '74 and '75, at Pooh's Pub, and between the US and European leg of Jaco's first Weather Report tour in '76, at The Jazz Workshop.  Metheny said about that time "...most of the music that was on my first album, Bright Size Life, was written as exercises for my students during that first semester.  I wanted to illuminate aspects of harmony and other things that I was curious about as an improviser that I couldn't apply in standards. During that same period, I would call Jaco to come up for gigs around Boston. It was a very interesting time. There was a lot going on in Boston then. Things that players were experimenting with were quite revolutionary at the time. Now they are almost taken for granted."

The trio recorded one album, Bright Size Life, in Germany in December of 1975.  They reunited in '79 for one song, Round Trip/Broadway Blues,  at the Newport Jazz Festival.Jaco recorded with Pat Metheny on the '74 album Pastorius/Metheny/Ditmas/Bley, and they both toured with Joni Mitchell on her Shadows and Light tour in '79.  Bob Moses played off and on with Jaco throughout Jaco's life, sitting in for Peter Erskine on some Word of Mouth dates, playing the odd gig, and having Jaco play on one of his solo albums (although the latter was never released).

The trio in the 70's had a cult like following, but none of the three had reached the legendary status that they would all eventually earn.  As such the few recordings from the period were done at the small clubs and bars around Boston.  The specifics of each performance were not rigorously documented at the time so they cannot be known with certainty.  

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June, 1974 / Pooh's Pub / Boston, MA

1. Bright Size Life 5:01 2. There Is No Greater Love 8:31 3. Exercise #6 (aka Unity Village) 4:15 4. Guitar / Drum Duo 5:53 5. Continuum  7:25 6. Guitar Solo 5:00 7. Unquity Road 4:14 8. Wrong is Right 5:57 9. Ida Lupino 10:33 10. All the Things You Are 10:50

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June, 1974 / Zircon / Somerville, MA

1. Exercise #3 (aka Missouri Uncompromised) 4:01 2. Sirabhorn 7:23 3. All is You (aka All Sus 4's) 14:42 4. April Joy 4:01 5. Stella by Starlight 10:55 6. Omaha Celebration 7:58 6. Mothuselai Blues 8:28

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July 4, 1975 / Pooh's Pub / Boston, MA

1. Omaha Celebration 8:03 2. All is You (aka All Sus 4's) 13:02

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June 16, 1976 / The Jazz Workshop / Boston, MA

1. Roundtrip / Broadway Blues 8:21 2. Bright Size Life 6:24 3. Exercise #6 (aka Unity Village) 5:35 4. All the Things You Are 11:17 5. Portrait of Tracy 4:10 6. Continuum 6:20

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