MUMBAI: As the jazz world's great five - Mitch Forman, Chuck Loeb, Dave Weckl, Eric Marienthal, Melvin Davis took centrestage, musicians and music industry stalwarts from Bollywood gathered to watch world renowed jazz band Metro perform on 11 February in Mumbai.

In the second half of the concert, keyboard player Mitchel Forman announced that a jazz album by Sandeep Chowta called 'Matters of the heart' is in the works.

The listeners were visibly surprised when Metro, besides playing their own repertoire, performed two tracks written by Sandeep Chowta namely 'Tribute' and 'No degrees of separation'. Mitchel Forman said, "'Matters of the heart' is a collaborative project and we (Metro) too have played on the album." Besides them, the album will feature some of the best known names of the jazz world.

The album will be released by Columbia Records India.

Earlier, in an interview to Radioandmusic.com, Chowta had said that he is also working with  Grammy award winning Pt Vishwa Mohan Bhatt for one of the tracks.

The last time Chowta got Maurizio Colonna and Frank Gambale to Mumbai, the passes ran out within minutes, and the story repeated itself when Brett Garsed and Virgil Donati came to Mumbai in August. Since Metro was ticketed, one could also see some empty seats. Needless to say, those who couldn't make it missed the awe inspiring music and Metro's electrifying stage presence.

Over the past few years, Sandeep Chowta has been keeping a low profile and has not been working on Hindi film projects. The reason - Chowta is being very selective about his film projects, and after taking over as Columbia Records Head (Indian Division), he has been collaborating with international musicians like Frank Gambale, Murizio Colonna, Brett Garsed, Virgil Donati, to name a few.

Musicians like Ehsaan Nooraani, Loy Medonsa, Amit Trivedi, Dhruv Ghanekar, Mahalakshmi Iyer, Louis Banks and Gino Banks and Satyajit Talwalkar from the SitarFunk attended the event.

Metro would be performing next in Bangalore on 14 February, 2009. The Sandeep Chowta project Metro is sponsored by Carlsberg and Rolling Stone.