Waiting for the Sunrise (Chesky Records)
Camille Thurman
Released August 24, 2018
17th Independent Music Awards Winner Jazz with Vocals
NAACP 50th Image Awards Nominee for Outstanding Jazz Album
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About:
Saxophonist Camille Thurman kept her singing under wraps all throughout her time at the famed LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts in New York City. And in college at SUNY-Binghamton, she wasn’t even a music major—she earned a bachelor’s degree in geological science. But in less than a decade as a professional singer and woodwinds player, she’s made her mark as one of the most promising—and intriguing—young musicians around.
Thurman hails from the St. Albans section of Queens, known for the many jazz greats who’d lived there during the swing era, including Count Basie and Ella Fitzgerald. Growing up, Thurman took inspiration from their musical accomplishments; she listened to these jazz masters, taught herself to plunk out tunes on the piano and started playing flute in middle school. (Tenor saxophone, her bailiwick today, came later.) Several educators along the way encouraged her playing, and eventually the final piece of her musicianship—artful scats and rich vocals—fell into place.
“It took a while to find out what I was comfortable with as my identity,” Thurman said. “I play and I sing. Sometimes society—especially for women—might pressure you to do one thing, because it might be aesthetically easier to accept.”
Arguably, as a musician, Thurman has taken the less-worn path, and so female role models were harder to find. She credits saxophone player Tia Fuller and bassist/singer Mimi Jones with helping her to land on her feet in New York after graduation. Their advice? If you’re going to sing and play, be great at both or don’t bother. Thurman took this advice to heart, and within a few years had placed as a finalist in the 2013 Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition, played at Jazz at Lincoln Center, toured internationally and performed alongside some of the biggest names in the jazz and r&b worlds.
Her debut album, Origins, and her second, Spirit Child, both released in 2014 on Jones’ label, Hot Tone Music, fueled Thurman’s rapid ascendancy. She followed these successes with Inside The Moment: Live At Rockwood Music Hall last year—her first album as a Chesky artist, and her first time using the binaural recording technique, which creates a three-dimensional sound sensation for the listener. This method doesn’t allow for audio “punch-ins,” however, so on her Chesky albums, Thurman relies on her expert ear and indefatigable skills as an improviser to guide her in her quest to record complete takes.
Her second recording for Chesky, Waiting For The Sunrise, dropped in August. Thurman sings more and plays less on this album, often deferring to her band, an ensemble of instrumentalists who worked with the singers who captivated her young ears back in St. Albans: Steve Williams, Shirley Horn’s drummer; Cecil McBee, Dinah Washington’s bassist; Jack Wilkins, Sarah Vaughan’s guitarist; and Jeremy Pelt, Cassandra Wilson’s trumpeter.
“She made it happen,” said Williams, remarking on the challenges a young player faces when recording with such iconic musicians. “She’s a bright light in the future of this music.”
This fall, Thurman has plans to finish a Horace Silver tribute album and tour as a guest musician with the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. The latter is quite an accomplishment for a player who made her Lincoln Center debut three years ago as part of a “Generations in Jazz” concert.
Suzanne Lorge (DownBeat)
Track Listing:
1. I Just Found Out About Love (Harold Adamson / Jimmy McHugh) 03:26
2. Some of These Days (Shelton Brooks) 06:31
3. Tarde (Márcio Borges / Milton Nascimento) 03:23
4. After You’ve Gone (Henry Creamer / Turner Layton) 07:41
5. September in the Rain (Al Dubin / Harry Warren) 04:44
6. The Nearness of You (Hoagy Carmichael / Ned Washington) 05:03
17th Independent Music Award Jazz Song with Vocals
7. Easy to Love (Cole Porter) 03:03
8. I’m on Your Side (Angela Bofill / Jeffrey Cohen / Narada Michael Walden) 05:42
9. World Waiting for Sunrise (Gene Lockhart / Ernest Seitz) 07:21
10. If You Love Me (Really Love Me) (Margueritte Monnet / Édith Piaf) 03:59
Personnel:
Camille Thurman: voice and tenor saxophone
Cecil McBee: bass
Jack Wilkins: guitar
Steve Williams: drums
Jeremy Pelt: trumpet
Recorded September 9th, 2017 at The Hirsch Center, Brooklyn, New York
Produced by David Chesky
Executive Producer: Norman Chesky
Recorded, edited, and mastered by Nicholas Prout
Second Engineer: Janelle Costa
Assistant Engineer: Rich Cerbini
General Assistant: Paul Machado
Art Design: Jeff Wong
Cover Design: Laura Cella
Review:
Camille Thurman was one of three bright young musicians who streaked across the Jazz firmament in 2014 with debut albums as leaders that listeners took to heart immediately (the others were drummer Shirazette Tinin and bassist Mimi Jones); the musicians had also formed the appropriately entitled label Hot Tone Music to announce that they had arrived. Miss Thurman (like the others) went on to send an urgent message, which in her case was that she was a tenor saxophonist to watch out for. Three albums later she appears to have added a new dimension to her artistry – that of a vocalist. She has tested the waters several performances ago including a memorable one together with Charenee Wade in homage to Sarah Vaughan (Jazz at Lincoln Center, 2017) and later as part of the vocal contingent of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra’s memorable world premiere of Wynton Marsalis Ever the Fonky Lowdown (Jazz at Lincoln Center, 2018).
This album Waiting for the Sunrise was recorded somewhere in between. It certainly “plays” like it was a long time coming because what Miss Thurman brings to this studio performance is a magnificent vocal instrument that immediately suggests that she was born to sing. Much of the repertoire comprises standards and show-tunes which Miss Thurman infuses with the Blues, which certainly appears to be part of her DNA. The manner in which she squeezes an elemental pain into the lyric of “If You Love Me (Really Love Me)” is evidence enough of her credentials as a Blues-woman of considerable potential. One Sheldon Brooks’ “Some of These Days”, her elongation of syllables, deep diving into the lower register as she taunts her departing lover suggests intimations of something that Bessie Smith might do. Of course all of this is done in Miss Thurman’s own inimitable way. And it’s not simply in these songs that she wears her Blues on her sleeve as a badge of courage. Of course, Miss Thurman is much more than a Blues singer; her Jazz chops suggest she is bound for a realm peopled by great pantheon of Jazz vocalists – men and women alike.
Miss Thurman also wields a BIG tone on the tenor saxophone, but she is tender as the petal of a rose even as she caresses the sinews of the phrases she makes, soloing in between vocal choruses. There is here, more than a passing resemblance to the tough tenderness of big Ben Webster in the prime of his existence. As ever the test of Miss Thurman’s artistry comes in the manner in which she can handle a ballad, which she does on Milton Nascimento’s ethereally beautiful “Tarde” – Jeremy Pelt is magnificent in his muted solo as well – but Miss Thurman’s masterful handling of Hoagy Carmichael and Ned Washington’s “The Nearness of You” is utterly breathtaking; easily the crowning glory of the album.
It bears mention that Miss Thurman’s rhythm section – the great bassist Cecil McBee and drum legend Steve Williams, who played with Shirley Horn for two and a half decades together with guitarist Jack Wilkins, who plays perfect foil to Miss Thurman on “After You’ve Gone” with his sly comping – are masterfully cast in slightly more than supporting roles on the album. And Nicholas Prout’s Binaural Technology recording on yet another magnificent Chesky production make this a Jazz album to die for.
Raul Da Gama (JazzDaGama)
