Joshua Blue: Black & Blue
NYFOS Records

For his debut solo album, British-American tenor Joshua Blue could have presented a programme of material from the operas in which he's appeared, La Bohème, Porgy & Bess, The Magic Flute, and Rigoletto among them. But in keeping with his first voice teacher's advice, “Be yourself, always,” Blue instead focuses on the music that shaped him before, in his words, “opera was even a blip on my radar.” The move turns out to be canny and inspired, as the release shows both how multi-faceted he is as a singer is and provides a wonderful showcase for his big, robust tenor. While it's not a concept album per se, the album celebrates America whilst also presenting an honest and not always flattering critique. Though Blue was born in England, the current Philadelphia resident grew up in Chicago and attended schools in Ohio and New York and is therefore well-qualified to engage in a commentary on his adopted homeland. Before Black & Blue, he also contributed to noteworthy recordings of Paul Moravec's Sanctuary Road and Jeanine Tesori's Blue.

How Black & Blue came about is itself interesting. In late 2017, Steven Blier, Juilliard faculty member and Artistic Director of the New York Festival of Song (NYFOS), was organizing a show that would embed the Black Lives Matter movement within the historical continuum of artist activism. Having asked the new-to-Juilliard Blue to tackle “Fats” Waller's “Black and Blue,” the pianist was so stunned by the rendition, Blier ended up titling Blue's release after it when NYFOS Records launched four years later. Joining the song on the release are others the two featured in subsequent NYFOS programs, including “Negrita” and “Freedom Train” in their first-ever recordings. Race and resilience are thematically front and centre on a set-list spanning five decades and featuring songs by Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon, Billy Strayhorn, and others.

Recorded at Brooklyn's Big Orange Sheep studios in late 2022, the album augments the singer and pianist on a number of tracks with keyboardist Jason Yeager, guitarist Alex Levine, drummer Jay Sawyer, bassists Will Slater and Vince Giordano, and horn players Jasim Perales (trombone) and Oskar Stenmark (cornet, trumpet). As flamboyant and high-spirited as Wonder's “Big Brother” is, it also contains serious messages having to do with inequality, poverty, and deprivation. Blue digs into the song with soulful abandon, and the rollicking accompaniment by Brier, Levine, Sawyer, and others serves notice that Black & Blue won't lack for excitement. That swinging opener segues into a lovely reading of Strayhorn's lilting “Day Dream,” with Blue essaying the ballad's elegantly arching melodies as if born to it.

As relevant today as when written decades ago and delivered in a powerful vocal-and-piano arrangement, “Freedom Train” sees Langston Hughes's 1947 poem about racial prejudice and voting inequality set to rousing gospel-tinged music by Sammy Heyward. Much the same could be said about Simon's “American Tune,” which, written in 1975 and also performed as a duet, movingly expresses the disillusion and weariness felt by Americans after Watergate and the political corruption of the Nixon era. As Blue sings, “Still, when I think of the road we're traveling on, I wonder what's gone wrong,” it's impossible not to think of more recent political developments.

Blue's range is demonstrated in the variety of styles encompassed by the thirteen songs, Black & Blue an album that veers from rambunctious gospel (Moses Hogan's “Walk Together Children”) and soul to spirituals (an energized treatment of Hall Johnson's “Ride On, King Jesus”) and even, in the case of Al D'Artega and W. C. Handy's endearing “Negrita,” rumba. With a muted Stenmark punctuating the performance, Blue and Blier give the title track a deep, bluesy reading, as they do another song from the American blues tradition, Handy's “Yellow Dog Blues. ”While “Strange Fruit,” written by Lewis Allan in 1937, is strongly associated with Billie Holiday, the arrangement Blier devised for Blue's powerful treatment pays tribute to Nina Simone. Harry Warren's “At Last” caps the release, the duo's inspired rendition ending the album on a ravishing note.

May 2023