What accounts for Holiday's ability to charge songs with an emotional edge of either ebullient joy or profound sadness?
Maybe the best way to celebrate Billie Holiday’s centennial year is to pay Lady Day a one-hour visit by listening to the 20 signature songs on Columbia/Legacy’s new, fine and mellow single-CD tribute called Billie Holiday: The Centennial Collection.
It’s not another one of those glorious, encyclopedically annotated and lavishly illustrated blockbuster box-sets of years past honoring Holiday, who was born April 7, 1915, and died, after years of drug and alcohol addiction, at just 44 in 1959. Nonetheless, in its concise, more modestly measured way, The Centennial Collection evokes more than enough of that ineffable Holiday aura to charm older fans and maybe even enchant young converts.
Issued almost at the same time, Legacy Recordings has also released a very different sort of Lady Day homage with the great contemporary jazz diva Cassandra Wilson’s Coming Forth By Day, a bold, highly imaginative, even unconventional yet also deeply appreciative tribute. Even before Holiday’s birthday, Wilson was promoting her tribute album on a whirlwind tour taking her from Tokyo and Hong Kong to the Apollo Theater and later this summer to the Newport Jazz Festival, and, just recently, in its sole Connecticut stop at the Ridgefield Playhouse.
Shrouded in mystical overtones, the CD’s title Coming Forth By Day is derived from an English translation of what Egyptologists had originally called the Book of the Dead. An ancient, Egyptian funerary papyrus collection of religious texts, the venerable work consists of magic spells invoked to aid the dead in their perilous journey through the underworld to the next world.
Explaining the metaphoric link with the sacred texts, Wilson describes Coming Forth By Day as “a collection of musical spells, prescriptions for navigating the dubious myths surrounding her (Holiday’s) life and times…a vehicle for the re-emergence of Billie’s songbook in the 21st century.”
Even if you’re a little skeptical about mixing music and metaphysics, or find the link between the Book of the Dead and Billie Holiday to be only papyrus-thin, you still might enjoy Wilson’s 21st century, multi-textured, expressionistic reimagination of Holiday, one of the 20th century’s greatest and most deeply expressive jazz singers.
But if you’re looking for a physical rather than a metaphysical way to connect with Holiday, just go directly to Columbia/Legacy’s 100th birthday party on The Centennial Collection.
Although it’s only a single disc compendium, its wide emotional range stretches from miraculously light-filled and life-affirming pieces, like “What A Little Moonlight Can Do” and “Them There Eyes,” to the darker nether regions Lady Day passes through in “Gloomy Sunday,” with its morose, love-sick theme of suicide, and, most dramatically, “Strange Fruit.”
A classic, early social protest song, “Strange Fruit” rages against the lynching of African-Americans and deep-rooted racism in America.
Holiday’s powerful delivery of the song’s scathing snapshot of black lynching victims (the strange fruit hanging from Southern poplar trees) is as gut-wrenchingly provocative today as when she made this recording in 1939.
Abel Meeropol’s words are literally made flesh -- even the smell of burning flesh -- by Holiday who makes the lyrics’ horrific images come alive with revolutionary, conscience-jolting force:
Southern trees bear strange fruit Blood on the leaves and blood at the root, Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze. Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
As the ultimate verbal dagger slaying the romantic moonlight and magnolia myth of the Old South, she sings:
Pastoral scene of the gallant South The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.
Anything but a lengthy screed against evil, this tightly-wrought, historic anthem against lynching moves in for the kill with graphic imagery in which the horrific, unnatural act perverts even nature itself. Lynching contaminates everything, even such normally poetic sources of inspiration and beauty as the sun, trees. wind and rain. As Holiday’s soliloquy explains:
Here is fruit for the crows to pluck For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop. Here is a strange and bitter crop.
What accounts for Holiday’s ability to charge songs with an emotional edge of either ebullient joy or profound sadness? And how does she create elation or melancholy with such seemingly effortless ease and directness as if she were speaking directly to you and no one else in the room?
Part of Holiday's secret is that she does all this with elegant simplicity and candor, free of all pretension. Evergreen songs "God Bless the Child" and the transformative "These Foolish Things" are on the album along with several others recorded between 1935 and 1945.
Most often, the high quality accompaniment for the songs is provided by all-star studio bands alternately billed as either Teddy Wilson and His Orchestra or Billie Holiday and Her Orchestra.
Holiday’s greatest and most empathetic collaborators show up on the anthology, including Teddy Wilson, a master swing stylist and maestro, a jazz Mozart who was the embodiment of elegance, flawless touch and lyrical expression, both as accompanist and soloist. Even on these vintage selections, which were limited to the three minutes or so allotted on 78 RPM recordings, Wilson’s consummate sense of clarity, concision and form allowed him to create dazzling, melodic inventions even in a tightly compressed, half-chorus of just 16 bars.
There's an inspiring unity here, a sense of creative community.
Lester Young, the wondrous tenor saxophonist and underrated clarinetist, lights up several tracks with his mysterious, otherworldly sounding solos, as does the great trumpeter Buck Clayton, who is more earthbound but also lustrous, even, at times as Lesterish as Young.
Young was Holiday’s musical alter ego and soul-mate. His melodically rich solos and perfect, empathetic obbligato figures behind Holiday make up some of the most beautiful, moving moments in jazz. Affecting poetry, it was created in the moment with no one ever dreaming that these sounds of jazz would still be moving listeners so profoundly, so many decades later.
All the little backup bands on these vintage studio recordings are packed with future Hall of Famers, ranging from Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw to Roy Eldridge and Charlie Shavers.
But more than just a showcase for all-star game attitudes, there’s an inspiring unity here, a sense of creative community even though these were relaxed, informal, almost breezy sessions where spontaneity reigned. It’s almost as if they were playing live, not in a studio.
What ultimately makes the pieces miraculous—even aside from all the collective talent and the moving, individual eloquence of Teddy Wilson and Lester Young-- is Lady Day’s legerdemain, a magic you can’t begin to explain.
Once you hear how Holiday sings a song, you’ll always hear that song in your head exactly the way she phrased it, no matter how many other versions or how many other artists you listen to in your lifetime. Her unique sound, timing and soul-wrenching inflections become an indelible part of your musical memory, maybe even a permanent part of the way you view the world. It’s a Holiday that never ends.
Samba Fest Dances into Hartford
An outdoor celebratory mix of Brazilian music and family-oriented activities, the admission-free, ninth annual Samba Fest will be in full swing from 11:00 am to 6:00 pm on Saturday, May 2, in Hartford at Mortensen Riverfront Plaza at 300 Columbus Boulevard.
Festivities begin with a samba parade open to everybody, with celebrants swaying to the music of The Trinity Samba Ensemble, directed by Eric Galm, an associate professor of music and ethnomusicology at Trinity College.
Adding to the parade’s celebratory spirit is a local favorite, The Hartford Hot Several Brass Band, marking the first steps in the al fresco gala in which Brazilian and Connecticut musicians join forces with Trinity College students.
Ivan Vilela, a noted Brazilian master of the viola caipira -- an acoustic guitar with ten steel strings -- returns for an encore performance at Samba Fest, which is produced by Trinity College in partnership with Riverfront Recapture.
Last spring, the noted instrumentalist/composer, who has made more than 15 albums and toured throughout Europe, performed solo at the Riverfront revelry, demonstrating why his dazzling style and technique have earned him prestigious prizes in his native country.
Vilela, one of Brazil’s noted practitioners of the popular folk guitar (its name is Portuguese for country guitar), leads his trio from Sao Paulo, which will be making its U.S. debut. His compatriots are Gilberto dos Syllos on acoustic bass, and Ari Colares on Brazilian percussion.
Adding to the musical carnival’s high spirits is the 12-member teenage Brazilian ensemble Meninos de Minas from Minas Gerais, which is also making its U.S. debut. Directed by Cleber Camargo, the band features a special guest, Adriano George, a trumpeter with the Brazilian band Berimbrown. The young samba scholars will also perform at a sneak preview of Samba Fest at noon on Thursday, April 30, at the Hartford Public Library at 500 Main Street.
Also performing at the festival are the Brazilian jazz group Sambeleza with Isabella Mendes; Friendz West African Drum and Dance; Trinity Steel Band, directed by Curtis Greenidge; and the Guakibom Jazz Band, a youth ensemble directed by the noted, Hartford-based Latin jazz trumpeter and orchestra leader, Ray Gonzalez.
A variety of family activities are also part of the festival fare. These include a “percussion zone” where children can play Brazilian instruments; a drum-making station; face painting by Amazing Face Art; and other crafts, activities and dance workshops in samba, the Afro-Brazilian martial art/dance/game of capoeira, and maculele, a “stick dance” developed by enslaved Africans on northeastern Brazilian sugar plantations. Brazilian food and merchandise will be available for purchase.
Rain or shine, the samba show goes on. WRTC, Trinity College radio at 89.3 FM, will broadcast the event live. For directions and parking information: sambafest.com. General information: (860) 297-2199.
Making the Old Sound New
Brooklyn-based trumpeter/composer John Raymond will be celebrating his just released album, Foreign Territory (Fresh Sound/New Talent), as he leads his quartet in performances at 8:30 and 10:00 pm on Friday, May 1, at New Haven’s Firehouse 12, 45 Crown Street.
On the new disc, Raymond takes a fresh look at the jazz tradition with original compositions designed to sound newly-minted and contemporary while simultaneously retaining the music’s classic sense.
His piece "Deeper," for example, was written on the chord progression for the standard, "How Deep Is The Water?" His "What Do you Hear?" is based on the changes to "I Hear a Rhapsody," a 1941 golden oldie interpreted by past masters ranging from Frank Sinatra to John Coltrane.
Helping Raymond make the old sound new through his deconstruction of the jazz tradition is pianist Dan Tepfer, bassist Joe Martin and drummer Craig Weinrib. Drummer Billy Hart, who performs on the CD, was originally scheduled to perform at Firehouse 12, but won’t be able to make the performance.
Tickets: $20.00, first set; $15.00, second set. Information: firehouse12.com and (203) 785-0468.
Going Out in a Blaze of Glory
For the avant-garde violinist/composer Jason Kao Hwang the title of his visionary work, Burning Bridge, might well symbolize a scorched-earth break with the past as he charges forward into the future to explore a brave new world created by his fiery fusion of jazz, classical and traditional Chinese music.
Hwang leads an octet, which plays both Western and Chinese instruments, in a performance of his Burning Bridge at 8:00 pm on Thursday, April 30, in the Magic Triangle Jazz Series at the University of Massachusetts’ Fine Arts Center’s Bezanson Recital Hall on the Amherst campus.
His companions in conflagration and artful anarchy are: Taylor Ho Bynum, cornet; Andrew Drury, drums; Ken Filiano, bass; Joseph Daley, tuba; Steve Swell, trombone; Sun Li, pipa, a four-stringed Chinese instrument sometimes called a Chinese lute; and Wang Guowei, erhu, a two-stringed Chinese violin/fiddle.
As a trailblazing genre blender of global proportions, Hwang has been warmly hailed by the Washington Post as a bellwether of the zeitgeist who “has his finger firmly on the racing pulse of the 21st century, where everything is interconnected and boundaries of time and geography seem hopelessly quaint.”
Hwang, who has performed and recorded with such fellow iconoclasts as Anthony Braxton and Pauline Oliveros, is a founding member of The Far East Side Band, an intercultural ensemble ecumenically commingling Chinese, Korean, Japanese and American musical elements. He was in the original cast of the Broadway production of “M. Butterfly,” performing music he co-arranged for the show, later touring with the national troupe as a music director. His experimental chamber opera, “The Floating Box: A Story in Chinatown,” premiered in 2001.
The concert marks the grand finale for the prestigious Magic Triangle’s 26th season, which goes out in a blaze of glory as Hwang and his co-conspirators reignite Burning Bridge. Tickets: $12.00, general public; $7.00, students. Available through the box office at (800) 999-UMAS.
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