VA: Black Lives: From Generation to Generation
Jammin'colorS

Big names such as Oliver Lake, Andy Milne, and Jean-Paul Bourelly contribute to the double-CD compilation Black Lives: From Generation to Generation, but all operate in humble service to the vision articulated by executive producer Stefany Calembert. It's less a star vehicle than a collective expression from a multitude of voices calling out racism and fighting for equality and social justice. A key impetus for the project was the death of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer, an event that sparked outrage and whose effects continue to reverberate in global protests. Her desire to respond to such crimes wasn't just a matter of social conscience. As the white spouse of bassist Reggie Washington and mother to their three multi-racial daughters, Calembert, a booker for the Brussels-based music agency and label Jammin'colorS, has witnessed racism first-hand, whether it be seeing its effect on her family or on Black friends and colleagues.

The recording casts its net wide, bringing into its twenty-track orbit American jazz figures but also married partners Guadeloupe-born saxophonist Jacques Schwarz-Bart and vocalist Stephanie McKay, Mali bandleader Cheick Tidiane Seck, Guadeloupe-born drummer Sonny Troupé, Martinique-born pianist Grégory Privat, and Togo/Benin-raised, Marseille-based drummer Yul. Family connections also run through the collection, from Oliver Lake and his drummer son Gene to brothers David and Marque Gilmore and Marcus and E. J. Strickland. Some address events directly—“Pre-Existing Conditions,” Oliver's scathing indictment of the Minneapolis coroner's original cause of George Floyd's death, for example—whereas others reference matters more allusively, the instrumental cuts obviously. While the 100-minute release is categorically a compilation, it plays like an ever-changing mixtape pulling together jazz, blues, spoken word, turntablism, and African grooves.

As if designed to purposefully accentuate where much of the album's music originated from, the release begins with the rousing vocal chants of Seck's “Sanga Bô.” On “We Are Here,” spoken word by Sharrif Simmons celebrates iconic figures such as Obama, Aretha, Mahalia, and Miles—“excellence in Black steel,” in his words—against a driving jazz-funk backdrop by the Gilmore siblings. In a related vein, Kokayi adds biting flow to Andy Milne's elegant pianisms in “Togged to the Bricks.” Trumpeter Jeremy Pelt infuses “Anthem for a Better Tomorrow” with silky jazz-fusion sparkle, and with saxophonist Schwarz-Bart, bassist Washington, trumpeter Franck Nicolas, and drummer Arnaud Dolmen aboard, pianist Privat initiates the album's second half with the suave jazz lyricism of “Friendship.” Even more appealing is Schwarz-Bart's “Dreaming of Freedom (For Tony)” for the loveliness of its ballad-like expression and McKay's wordless contributions.

Partnering with jazz keyboardist Federico González Peña, Gene Lake takes a funk-fusion ride on “Back & Forth,” Immanuel Wilkins' blues-drenched “Praying” features the alto saxophonist supplicating alongside guitarist Marvin Sewell, and the latter takes a solo turn on “A Hero's Journey,” this one an exercise in spooky slide atmospherics. While Marcus Strickland's woodwinds-laden funk groove in “Matter” receives a nice bump from Christie Dashiell's vocal textures, his drummer brother E. J. weighs in with a mellifluous jazz performance spiked by Joel Ross's vibraphone and Lydia Harrell's layered voices in “Language of the Unheard.” One of the more unusual cuts is “Walk” for coupling Alicia Hall Moran's operatic delivery with DJ Grazzhoppa's turntable effects, and the album's elsewhere elevated by an affecting duet, “From the Outside In,” featuring Tutu Puoane singing the words of South African poet Lebogang Mashile with Ewout Pierrieux on Fender Rhodes.

April 2022