sábado, 17 de octubre de 2009

The Dirty Dozen Brass Band - Funeral For A Friend 2004


The Dirty Dozen Brass Band - Funeral For A Friend 2004
Label: BMG/Artemis Records/Ropeadope Records  

Jazz

New Orleans' the Dirty Dozen Brass Band is the rotating roster of brass players created twenty-seven years ago to lead jazz funerals. In a twist of fate, the band has returned to its roots after one of its own, co-founder Anthony "Tuba Fats" Lacen, died of a heart attack. Funeral for a Friend opens with the dirge "Just a Closer Walk With Thee," appropriate for the steps of the church, but soon moves into the melancholic yet ultimately uplifting "I Shall Not Be Moved," before hitting its revelatory stride with "Jesus on the Mainline," featuring the Davell Crawford Singers. It is hard not to feel transported to a cobbled New Orleans street off Jackson Square -- the production is crisp, the players' energy erupts through the speakers and the spiritual power of the music infuses every one of the ten tracks, winding up with a raucous rendition of "Down by the Riverside" and a heartfelt "Amazing Grace." The Dirty Dozen have come home with Funeral for a Friend and bring everyone with them.
By ANDREW STRICKMA
**
On their tenth album, the Crescent City's Dirty Dozen Brass Band bring it all back to the cobblestone streets where it began. The Dozens have done it all, from straight New Orleans jazz to restless funky experimentation, and here they put it all down to the roots of its origin. Funeral for a Friend is just that, a complete reenactment of a New Orleans funeral or "homecoming." The Dozens played them at the beginning and continue to. The set is dedicated to the memory of founding member Anthony "Tuba Fats" Lacen, who passed away just a few weeks after its completion. The band performed it in the streets leading the horse-drawn carriage procession. Comprised entirely of gospel and spiritual songs, it follows the trajectory of a departed one's life from birth to celebrations of her or his character to death and resurrection in the afterlife. The first of the three stages begins with a slow, mournful dirge that emerges as "Just a Closer Walk With Thee," as the gathering begins at the courthouse and becomes a strident statement in "I Shall Not Be Moved," where the grief begins to give way to the feeling of victory, that the departed has broken the bondage of this life's prison. The music begins to swell and swirl and gains in stridency and emotion until it actually erupts about five tracks in with "Jesus on the Mainline," with the band accompanied by the Davell Crawford Singers. The mind-blowing thing is the sound; though this was recorded in a studio, the listener feels like she's in the middle of a throng of marchers, surrounded by the band and the choir. The second stage begins with a stunning rendering of "John the Revelator" that simulates being played at the gravesite and offers this bluesy prophetic read on the entrance of the departed into a new order prophesied. It is resolved in "I'll Fly Away," with Melody Palmer leading the choir in a rowdy statement of death's defeat. This is followed by an altar call in "Is There Anybody Here That Loves My Jesus?" The final stage -- leaving the cemetery for home -- is commenced by the funky read of "Down by the Riverside," and is resolved in the celebratory gratitude for mercy in "Amazing Grace." But this review does nothing, literally, to describe the sheer power of the transference of emotion that Funeral for a Friend does. This is easily the most heartfelt, honestly rendered, and stunningly captured moment of the DDBB's recording career; it belongs in every household where the celebration of life and its transition from the sorrow of death to the eternal afterlife is honored. It is not only a classic in the genre, but will come to be regarded as a jazz classic, period.
By Thom Jurek. AMG.
**
Roger Lewis- Baritone Saxophone
Gregory Michael Davis II- Trumpet
Kirk Joseph- Sousaphone
Kevin Harris- Tenor Saxophone
Efrem Towns- Trumpet, Flugelhorn
Jeffrey Hills Sr.- Sousaphone
Julius McKee- Sousaphone
Sammie Williams- Trombone
Terence Higgins- Drums
Jamie McClean- Guitar
Davell Singers Crawford- Vocals
David Hidalgo- Accordion  
**
01. Just a Closer Walk With Thee - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Traditional  5:30
02. I Shall Not Be Moved - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Morris, Homer  4:58
03. Please Let Me Stay a Little Longer - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Traditional  3:06
04. What a Friend We Have in Jesus - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Traditional  3:44
05. Jesus on the Mainline - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Traditional  5:18
06. John the Revelator - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Johnson, Blind Will  4:39
07. I'll Fly Away - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Brumley, Albert  3:39
08. Is There Anybody Here That Loves My Jesus? - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Moore, Undine Smith  3:06
09. Down by the Riverside - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Stickles, William  5:06
10. Amazing Grace - The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Newton, John  1:05
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