Cassandra Wilson: After The Beginning Again auf CD
After The Beginning Again
Herkömmliche CD, die mit allen CD-Playern und Computerlaufwerken, aber auch mit den meisten SACD- oder Multiplayern abspielbar ist.
- Label:
- Winter & Winter
- Aufnahmejahr ca.:
- 1991
- Artikelnummer:
- 6608327
- UPC/EAN:
- 0025091905829
- Erscheinungstermin:
- 5.10.2004
Jeff Heynes
*** 24 Bit digitally remastered
Undoubtedly, her intonation and phrasing are influenced by some of the great jazz vocalists. But Cassandra Wilson does not vote for traditionalism. In her understanding, jazz is "a part of us looking at ourselves. That's why jazz is very important and why it's important not to place it where it can become static or where it can be a museum piece".
Cassandra Wilson votes for evolution and open-mindedness. She is never afraid of getting in touch with today's popular sounds like hip hop and funk music. "Hip hop is jazz", she says, "the real good rap cats swing". And she is able to realize the synthesis of pop and jazz within her own music. The New York Times wrote about one of Cassandra's concerts: "Ms. Wilson latched on to the power of pop - good melodies, an assortment of rhythms and dance beats, songs and electronics - without sacrificing any of jazz's improvisational or musical power".
Cassandra's translation of jazz into today's sounds come totally out of her own style. She knows how to rely on her own phrasing and not to merely follow a rigid beat. She has adopted intervals and metres that were formerly unusual in vocal music. She sings well-known lyrics with a new emphasis and an up-to-date freedom. And she writes her own lyrics, dealing with black women's reality.
Thus Cassandra has become an interpreter in the word's full sense. She is not only a performer, but gives true life to her songs and makes them happen. "She has the ability to deliver not just the words but also the mood and feeling and the whole scenario of a lyric", Henry Threadgill said about her. And the New York Times discovered in her music "a new set of emotions that haven't been heard, or felt, before".
Here is a voice you won't never forget: a dark alto, switching from smoky to sweet, from warm to clear, from intimate to passionate. The brittle spell of this voice holds a universe of feelings in store - far beyond the question of musical styles and directions. A critic called Cassandra's tunes "art songs in popular context". They are like movies made up of pure emotion and sound. Cassandra calls herself a "vocal musician", for she is not the kind of vocalist who leaves the stage after singing her chorus. The performance as a whole belongs to her musical concept. "Her singing is totally integrated with the music", wrote the music magazine Straight No Chaser, "with a lot of interplay between her vocals and the instrumentation".
This would be impossible without an experienced team of musicians who know Cassandra's intentions and make her unusual style sound completely natural. Keyboardist James Weidman wrote two pieces of the new album, together with the singer. His piano runs are refreshing, but never become too obtrusive in a virtuoso manner. Bassist Kevin Bruce Harris and drummer Mark Johnson have been Cassandra's reliable rhythm team for years. Listen to the soft tensions between the lyrical electric bass and Cassandra's hazy timbre on Harris' own tune Sweet Black Night. The fine interplay between the musicians is completed by percussionist Jeff Haynes who gives each tune its individual flair.
With the opener alone, There She Goes, Cassandra claims a main role in the music of the nineties. Yazoo Moon has a special dramatic feeling depending on Weidman's synthesizer riffs. The two jazz ballads, Round Midnight and Baubles, Bangles And Beads, appear in a more slender and honest shape than usual. Both, Round Midnight and the original My Corner Of The Sky, have already been heard on Cassandra's European tour in 1991 (Live, JMT 919 047-2). Finally, the fascinating Redbone connects the tradition of Black work songs with contemporary hip hop. It seems as if the whole history of Black American music is condensed in one song.
Cassandra's seventh album on JMT is kind of retrospective. Her debut in 1985, Point of View (JMT 919 004-2) , was one of the formative albums of what was to become the M-Base movement. The next milestone was Blue Skies (919 018-2), Cassandra's highly acclaimed acoustic standard album. Jumpworld (JMT 919 033-2) marked the beginning of her flirt with hip hop. Traces of all of them can be found on After the Beginning again, Cassandra's last album for JMT after seven years of successful cooperation.
Rezensionen
K. Lippegaus in Stereo 4/93: "Wie Cassandra Wilson diese simple Story aufrollt, ihr einen Groove gibt, ist umwerfend. Wer da nicht nach ein paar Sekunden mitzuckt, sollte vielleicht einen Arzt aufsuchen, das Rauchen einstellen oder mehr Sport treiben."Disk 1 von 1 (CD)
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1 There she goes
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2 'Round midnight
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3 Yazoo Moon
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4 Sweet black night
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5 My corner of the sky
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6 Baubles, bangles and beads
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7 Redbone
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8 Summer wind
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