V/A “Spiritual Jazz” (Jazzman)

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:16:12 +0000

“As far as spirituality is concerned, I feel that I want to be the force which is truly for good,” said John Coltrane back in 1966, and the musicians on this compilation must have equally been driven by the same desire to play music for the creator, and at the same time music that spoke directly to their people. While the sleevenotes make the case that much of this music worked at a more cerebral level than that of the free jazz crowd, this was still the sound of struggle. Francis Gooding probably gets it about right when he says “If the Fire Music of Archie Shepp was a call for social and political change, then spiritual jazz asked for personal change…The ‘60s was the decade in which the personal became the political.” On what is the best jazz compilation since Soul Brother’s African Spirits, James Tatum Trio provides the introduction with a stunning ‘Jazz Mass’ recorded in Detroit and when you consider this was a City still recovering from the uprisings, then Cornwell Carrington’s plea of ‘Lord Have Mercy’ takes on a deep resonance. Lloyd Miller was just one of many jazzmen of the period to look East for enlightenment and ‘Gol-e Gandom’ is a truly stunning piece of modal jazz. Salah Ragab was of course the Egyptian who collaborated with Sun Ra during his famous visit and alongside Senegal’s Mor Thiam shows here how players across the world were inspired by Trane’s message. But it’s the Stateside players here who shine the brightest, and big respect to the Jazzman crew for opening our ears to the likes of Morris Wilson whose ‘Paul’s Ark’ is as moody a piece of biblical jazz as you’ll ever here, and for digging deep to find gems like ‘Psych City’ from the inmates of Ohio Penitentiary. Now you really do need to check that one! (Andy Thomas)

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V/A “Spiritual Jazz” (Jazzman)