Dear Love (Empress Legacy Records)
Jazzmeia Horn
Released September 10, 2021
AllMusic Favorite Jazz Albums 2021
Grammy Nominee for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album 2022
JAZZ FM 25 Best Jazz Albums of 2021
Arts Fuse 2021 Jazz Critics Poll Top 10 Vocal Album
JazzWeek 2022 Year End Top 100 Jazz Chart
New York City Record Best Vocal Releases of 2021
70th DownBeat Annual Critics Poll Top 10 Album of the Year
YouTube
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About:
September 2021 welcomes the release of Dear Love, the brand new project by US jazz luminary, vocalist and composer Jazzmeia Horn. A winner of the Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Competition and the Thelonious Monk Institute International Jazz Competition, Jazzmeia Horn is also a NAACP Image Award winning artist. Having signed to Concord Records, her debut album ‘A Social Call’ achieved great critical acclaim, receiving a GRAMMY Award® nomination in the category of Best Jazz Vocal Album. Jazzmeia’s second album ‘Love and Liberation’, received yet another GRAMMY® nomination in the same category. Now Jazzmeia Horn makes a triumphant return with a big band orientated album – a notable departure from her previous work and a unique proposition, undoubtedly set to build on hercompelling reputation as one of America’s most exciting and impactful jazz stars.
Dear Love, addresses three specific aspects of Jazzmeia’s existence, her community, her lover and herself. The album is infused with poetry and spoken word through letters of encouragement – it is the first time that these proponents of Jazzmeia’s creative talents feature on her recorded work. Dear Love is also one of the first times that a black female vocalist has written and fronted a big band album in its entirety (this having historically always been a male preoccupation) and the addition of strings elevates the album to that of a major orchestral project.
Having embarked on an exhilarating voyage of discovery by listening to artists such as Booker T, Little Jimmy Scott, Bebop Betty Carter, Frank Wess, Jackie McLean, René McLean, George Coleman J.J. Johnson and many more pioneering figures in early jazz, an intuition like no other developed within Jazzmeia’s psyche, allowing her to assimilate and absorb what she has heard and fully digest it until it is attached to her soul. This gift allows Jazzmeia to carry the torch for these legends of yesteryear, while heralding in a new and evolved era for the tradition of straightahead, classic jazz.
Similarly inspired by musicians such as Erykah Badu and her collaborative work with rappers such as Common and Talib Kweli, as well as Lauren Hill’s status within the Fugees, Jazzmeia Horn provides a unique slant to her work by combining these influences with the nuances of iconic jazz figures such as those mentioned above. The result is a sound that simultaneously holds classic qualities and a contemporary edge.
The making of Dear Love citing Jazzmeia and her collaborators’ journey throughout the project is being filmed in order to capture the creative process and to further demonstrate the concept behind the album itself. This documentary footage will be broadcast on network television in spring 2022. Jazzmeia also plans to tour the album extensively, with some flagship shows with The Frankfurt Philharmonic Orchestra scheduled for October 2021.
Dear Love is an ambitious and exhilarating project that represents some of Jazzmeia Horn’s very best work to date, reinforcing her status as one of the most versatile and exciting international jazz artists in the world today.
Track Listing:
1. I Feel You Near (Jazzmeia Horn) 2:43
2. Be Perfect (Jazzmeia Horn) 0:52
3. He Could Be Perfect (Jazzmeia Horn) 5:53
4. He’s My Guy (Jazzmeia Horn) 3:51
5. Let Us (Take Our Time) (Jazzmeia Horn) 8:06
6. Back to Me (Jazzmeia Horn) 0:31
7. Lover Come Back to Me (Jazzmeia Horn) 3:18
8. Money Can’t Buy Me Love (Jazzmeia Horn) 4:59
9. Nia (Jazzmeia Horn) 5:00
10. Strive (Jazzmeia Horn) 0:58
11. Strive (To Be) (Jazzmeia Horn) 11:05
12. Where We Are (Jazzmeia Horn) 5:48
13. Judah Rise (Jazzmeia Horn) 2:03
14. Where Is Freedom!? (Jazzmeia Horn) 6:57
Personnel:
Jazzmeia Horn: vocals, narrator
Rhythm section (3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 14)
Keith Brown: piano
Eric Wheeler: bass
Anwar Marshall: drums
HORNS (1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 14)
Bruce Williams: alto saxophone
Keith Loftis: tenor saxophone
Anthony Ware: tenor saxophone 2
Jason Marshall: baritone saxophone
Freddie Hendrix: lead trumpet
Bruce Harris: trumpet 2
Josh Evans: trumpet 3
Dion Tucker: lead trombone
Cory Wilcox: trombone 2
Max Seigel: bass trombone
Sullivan Fortner: organ (14)
Khalil Kwame Bell: percussion (1, 11, 13, 14)
STRINGS (8 & 12)
Tia Allen: viola
Chiara Fasi: violin
Eddie Findiesen: violin
Dara Hankins: cello
Recorded at Sound on Sound Studio, Montclair, New Jersey, May 28-30, 2021
Executive Producer: Jazzmeia Horn
Recorded, Mixed & Mastered by Kastushico Naito
Assistant Engineer: Christoper Gold
Musical Director: Sullivan Fortner
Album Design, Stylist and Artistic Direction: Jazzmeia Horn
Photography: Drew Brodeaux
Makeup: Dominique Jenelle
Special Assistance: Negesti Cantave & Richard Bernard
Review:
Since her 2017 debut A Social Call, Jazzmeia Horn—like her fellow Dallas native Erykah Badu—has plumbed the art of vocalizing in a manner suggesting a gold miner looking to alchemically forge something precious and new. While Badu moved toward neo-soul and hip-hop, Horn found her treasure in slightly askew jazz (and Ntozake Shange-esque poetry) and never looked back. With a resonant voice and a cheeky adoration of scat, she simply brings joy to everything she swings.
For Dear Love—her third album, and first with her Gil Evans-ish band, Her Noble Force, writ large atop the credits—there’s a gentleperson’s agreement: Keep it soulful but always just a little weird. Take the angular, elastic “Let Us (Take Our Time),” or the oblique Ella-meets-Anita O’Day cover of “Lover Come Back to Me” with the band following her rhythmic lead. Take the honking, tooting, body-aching, agave-smelling blues of the spoken-word “I Feel You Near,” or the bifurcated, rim-riding “He Could Be Perfect.” This is the lopsided, triple-knotted tone of Horn’s Noble Force, acting with taste and nuance. This is the tonic sound of a bright singer and ensemble interacting as one fluid lifeforce.
There are more symmetrical numbers too, such as the percolating “He’s My Guy,” on which Horn almost manages the role of a traditional big-band chanteuse, rising horn charts and all, or the gentle Billie-esque ballad, “Money Can’t Buy Me, Love,” where her clarion call is more direct than UPS. Or the slinky organ-driven funk of “Where Is Freedom?,” which causes Noble Force and Horn to jump off the bandstand and shout about how politics and prayer unify.
Horn is one of nu-jazz’s boldest figures, a singular presence. On Dear Love, she’s making Noble Force a giant part of that singularity. When it’s lonely at the top, sometimes you bring a friend.
A.D. Amorosi (JazzTimes)
