Shirley Caesar

Soul Jazz Records’ Holy Church of the Ecstatic Soul: Gospel, Funk and Soul at the Crossroads 1971-83 draws upon the extensive links between black American gospel music and soul music, showing how the sensibilities of gospel artists such as Shirley Caeser, Dorothy Norwood, Andrae Crouch and others crossed over into secular soul music during this period.

The concept of a compilation of Bob Dylan's gospel songs is certainly an idea whose time has come. That this does not feature Dylan performing the original versions of these songs is yet another. Executive producer Jeffrey Gaskill assembled a wide-ranging assortment of the hottest talent in the gospel arena, both past and present, to perform the songs from Dylan's Slow Train Coming and Saved albums, and producer Joel Moss extracted phenomenal performances from Shirley Caesar, the Fairfield Four, the Sounds of Blackness, Rance Allen, the Chicago Mass Choir fronted by Regina McCrary (who sang backup for Dylan on the 1978 and 1979 tours when these recordings were originally done), the Mighty Clouds of Joy, Helen Baylor (with Billy Preston), Aaron Neville, Dottie Peoples, Lee Williams & the Spiritual QC's, Mavis Staples, and Dylan himself (performing a duet on a completely rewritten version of "Gonna Change My Way of Thinkin'").

This musical release from psychobilly band The Caravans captures a live performance recorded at The Charlotte in Leicester, and features popular songs like "More Whiskey", "Princess of Darkness", and "Worthless Weekend Clique". During the period stretching from the late '50s to the mid-'60s, the Caravans went unrivaled as the nation's most popular touring gospel group; acclaimed as one of the greatest female acts ever to arrive on the spiritual music front, their fluctuating roster was unparalleled as a launching pad for future superstars - Shirley Caesar, Inez Andrews, Bessie Griffin and James Cleveland were just a few of the ensemble's alumni who later went on to solo fame.

Wynton Marsalis - Reeltime (1999) {Columbia–Sony Classical SK51239}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 326 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 143 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 10 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1999 Columbia / Sony Classical | SK 51239
Jazz / Neo-Bop / Jazz Blues / Trumpet

Sometimes even the powerful Wynton Marsalis has to take no for an answer, as his score for the film Rosewood was commissioned and completed but ultimately not used. In this case, it's clearly the filmmakers' loss, for Marsalis has written a soulful, stylistically wide-ranging set of cues that he put out anyway as part of his massive 1999 release schedule. The theme song for Rosewood is a cool, studied, country blues-flavored tune with Cassandra Wilson exploiting the husky tones of her bottom range.