International Anthem Recording Co.

Dawid, Angel Bat - Requiem for Jazz [2LP Limited Edition Purple Vinyl, w/ Poster] - New LP

$ 34.00

Composer, clarinetist, singer and educator Angel Bat Dawid announces the release of a new work, Requiem For Jazz. A 12-movement suite composed, arranged, and inspired in part by dialogue from Edward O. Bland’s 1959 film The Cry of Jazz, the album is a wide-ranging treatise on the African American story from one of its most astute narrators.

Itself an incisive critique of racial politics in the USA, The Cry of Jazz draws formal comparisons between the structure of jazz music and the African American experience - as one of freedom and restraint, of joy and suffering - that manifests in the triumph of spirit over the crushing prejudice of daily life.

Cutting together archive reels from Black neighborhoods in Chicago with live performance footage from Sun Ra and his Arkestra among others, the film remains a radical and prescient evocation of Black pride and its roots in the history of jazz, from spirituals to blues and beyond.

As South African writer Nombuso Mathibela captures in the album’s liner notes:

[Music is our weapon of struggle]
that radiantly holds our positive aspiration, group pride and determination as Black people. Sonics! our beautiful fire that gave light to the world.
And a world that gave us blues. The blues that gave us Black in jazz

Drawing a through line to today’s vibrant avant-garde, Angel Bat Dawid’s Requiem For Jazz picks up the liberation work laid out by Bland’s film, taking the message of joy and suffering within the Black classical tradition into a contemporary setting.

Music from the project was originally premiered at the Hyde Park Jazz Festival in Chicago in 2019, where Angel conducted a multigenerational fifteen-piece instrumental ensemble of Black musicians from across Chicago’s creative community, alongside a four-person choir (featuring singers from Black Monument Ensemble) as well as dancers and visual artists.

Recordings from the performance were then mixed and post-produced by Angel, who added interludes, vocals and additional sounds. As well as transcribing a piece from the film, Requiem For Jazz also alludes to The Cry of Jazz through contributions from the Sun Ra Arkestra’s Marshall Allen and Knoel Scott on the album’s final movement, which were recorded remotely at the historic Arkestral Institute of Sun Ra in Philadelphia in late 2020.

“I want us to have this very wonderful conversation that Ed Bland started over 50 years ago and I want to continue the conversation; because this is a loving conversation that we need to have with each other” - Angel Bat Dawid, Feb 2023

credits

releases March 24, 2023

Requiem for Jazz Composed, Arranged, Conducted & Mixed by Angel Bat Dawid

except “My Rhapsody,” from the 1959 Ed Bland film “The Cry of Jazz,” composed by Paul Severson & Norman Leist (Glenayre Publishing Co. BMI), arranged by Angel Bat Dawid.

Lyrics include extracts from “The Cry of Jazz” and the Roman Catholic Liturgical Requiem Missal.

Requiem for Jazz Intros/Interludes Composed, Produced, Mixed & Performed by Angel Bat Dawid

Requiem for Jazz premiered Sept, 30th 2019 at the Reva & David Logan Center for the Arts in Chicago, IL. Commissioned for the 2019 Annual Hyde Park Jazz Festival.

Recorded Live by Najee-Zaid Searcy & Dave Vettraino

Mastered by Najee-Zaid Searcy

Tha ArkeStarzz:
Piano - Dr. Charles Joseph Smith
Contrabass - Jeremiah Hunt
Percussion - Vincent Davis
Auxiliary Instruments - Xristian Espinoza
Electronics - Norman W. Long
Flute - Dr. Adam Zanolini
Clarinet - Hannah Washington
Trumpet - Sam Thousand
Soprano Saxophone - Isaiah Collier
Alto Saxophone - Fred Jackson Jr.
Tenor Saxophone - Kwesaiah
Violin - J’Niya Blunt
Violin - DaJour Smith
Viola - Michelle Manson
Cello - Olula

Tha Choruzz:
Soprano - Tramaine Parker
Alto - Monique Golding
Tenor - Deacon Julian Otis Cooke
Baritone - Phillip Armstrong

Special Cosmic Guests on “Lux Aeterna- Eternal Light/My Rhapsody”:
Marshall Allen - Alto Sax, Ewi
Knoel Scott - Percussion

Dancers:
Viktor Le Givens
Aquarius

Set Design:
Viktor Le Givens

Visualz:
Jonathan Woods
Liz Gomez

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