Frank London and The Elders

Spirit Stronger Than Blood

ESP-Disk

This is just the third time we have brought you an album from the forward-thinking ESP-Disc label, having reviewed Matthew Shipp’s trio album New Concepts in Piano Jazz and his duo with Ivo Perelman, Magical Incantation. Now we have New York-based trumpeter-composer Frank London, widely known for his work with The Klezmatics, Hasidic New Wave and the Klezmer Brass Allstars, or the leader of the funky Conspiracy Brass. London was recently diagnosed with myelofibrosis, an extremely rare and fatal blood cancer, so he dedicates the aptly-titled Spirit Stronger Than Blood to dear friends and colleagues who have passed away from blood diseases or cancer – fellow trumpeters Lester Bowie and Ron Miles, sax player Thomas Chapin, Yiddish singer, musician and activist Adrienne Cooper, writer Isabelle Deconinck, iconoclast vocalist-bassist-cantor Jewlia Eisenberg, and his namesake, Frank London Brown. In the liners, London states that ESP-Disk changed his life with the LPs Albert Ayler’s Bells and The Fugs’ First Album, citing their energy, humor, history, intensity, abstraction, anger, love, and creativity – elements that he strives to represent here. Yes, we are obviously latecomers in terms of reviews to the ESP-Disk catalog.

London’s group, The Elders is comprised of saxophonist, Rabbi Greg Wall who played with London in Hasidic New Wave, bassist Hilliard “Hill” Green, known for his work with Jimmy Scott, octogenarian drummers Newman Taylor Baker, and pianist Marilyn Lerner. London, Lerner, Greene and Baker are in the Yiddish and klezmer band Neshoma together. Baker played together with Greene and Shipp on Jemeel Moondoc’s The Astral Revelations

London says that Spirit Stronger Than Blood pays homage to some of the albums that shaped his musical-spiritual aesthetics: Charles Mingus’s Changes One & Two (Atlantic, 1975), Booker Little’s Out Front (Candid, 1961), Elvin Jones-McCoy Tyner Quintet’s Love & Peace (Trio, 1982), Clifford Thornton & The Jazz Composers Orchestra’s Gardens of Harlem (JCOA, 1975), and Alice Coltrane’s Ptah, The El Daoud (Impulse!, 1970).

Opener, the gentle, reverent “Let There Be Peace” is inspired by the Jewish prayer Oseh Shalom, asking the Almighty to bring us peace, and is performed in Coltrane or in modern terms Isaiah Collier-like fashion, albeit a trumpet as the lead voice.  Standout, the post-bop “Resilience” is dedicated to Lester Bowie and brings in Wall for the first of his four appearances. He and London engage in a riveting dialogue, anticipating and responding to each other telepathically and with much fervor following Lerner’s gleaming piano solo with Baker propelling all forward. The pensive title piece begins with a Coltrane/McCoy Tyner-like flourish. dedicated to Jewlia Eisenberg. Again, Lerner is all over the keys in her energetic turn, ceding to an emotive, soaring solo from London, followed by Ward, who fiercely extends the burning theme.

“Poem for a Blue Voice” moves back to a balladic vein and is dedicated to Isabelle DeKonnink, and was inspired by a poem of her partner, a davida singer. London mentions in the liners that the blood disease never squashed DeKonnink’s spirit, and thus he and the quintet carry forth in elegiac tones with gorgeous turns from Lerner, Wall, and the leader. The only piece directly associated with the Klezmer legacy is “Abundant Love,”, based on the Jewish prayer mode, Ahava Raba, and he dedicates it to his wife and children. A well-conceived arco solo from Green effectively introduces the peace, in which London soars over the throbbing rhythm section, led by Lerner’s stellar comping. Closer “Resistance/Healing” is for the late trumpeter/cornetist Ron Miles, a post-bop tune in classic jazz quintet style, that begins with Wall at his most aggressive stance on the disc, inspiring an equally fiery statement from Londo. Unlike the more spiritual compositions, this one reveals the power of the unit, totally locked in and generating controlled fury with a to-die-for finale!

In recent reviews, we commented on the dearth of spiritual jazz these days. This is one that lovers of the spiritual side need to hear. The inspiration is remarkably touching throughout.

• Jim Hynes

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