Country Preacher
In which I eat humble pie and backtrack from what I said about live albums when discussing Delaney and Bonnie 🙂
Country Preacher was recorded live in Chicago in 1969 at an Operation Breadbasket event led by Rev. Jesse Jackson, who makes the introduction to the album. Operation Breadbasket was a movement organised by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference aimed at improving the economic conditions of black communities. It is heart and soul part of the civil rights movement.
But there are no earnest, white folksingers with acoustic guitars here; neither is this black music modulated for a white jazz audience. This is the real deal, and part of that is the interaction with the audience; the live nature of the recording is not about audience response per se but the audience response to what the music evokes. And what it evokes is black pride, music and dignity. The only problem I have with this album is that it is too damned short at 38 minutes.
The music swings, it’s funky, it’s hot; there’s a blues tune, and when they finally get round to a bit more exploratory jazz in the second half of Afro-Spanish Omlette the audience is right there with them. When they segue from Joe Zawinuls Country Preacher into Nat Adderley’s Hummin’, you just know there was no one sitting down. Another one for the shopping list when the present difficulties are over.
I couldn’t find the whole thing on YouTube, so it’s a Spotify link only tonight for the complete album. But here’s Hummin’
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