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Wadada Leo Smith

Najwa

Label: TUM Records

Format: CD

Genre: Jazz

Out of stock

Wadada Leo Smith´s new album Najwa features four compositions in tribute to past masters of creative music, Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Ronald Shannon Jackson and Billie Holiday, as well as the title composition "Najwa" in remembrance of a love lost. Compared to Smith´s prior recordings, the presence of four guitarists and Bill Laswell´s electric bass create a unique sound world and fluidity for the music. Although Wadada Leo Smith has worked with electric guitars in the past, including in his Organic ensemble and in Yo Miles! which he co-led with Henry Kaiser, Najwa puts the guitar in an even more central role. All four guitarists have worked with Smith before; Michael Gregory Jackson since Smith´s early years in New Haven in the 1970s, Henry Kaiser in Yo Miles!, and Brandon Ross and Lamar Smith (Smith´s grandson) in Organic. In addition to the guitars, Bill Laswell´s electric bass takes a central role in the sonic world of Najwa and Laswell also played an important part in the post-production and mixing of the music on the album. Smith says that he enjoyed "the idea of making this session and then going back and re-recording some of the areas and then sitting down with Bill and allowing him to tweak it in certain ways and re-reference it in a whole different way. I very much like that notion, that idea or that philosophy." This was the first time Smith and Laswell recorded together but their collaborations have continued both live and in the recording studio.

Details
Cat. number: TUM CD 049
Year: 2017
Notes:
Recorded at MSR Studios in New York City on March 6 and 7, 2014. Additional recording at Orange Music Sound Studios in West Orange, New Jersey. Mixed at Orange Music Sound Studios. Mastered at Turtle Tone Studio in New York City. Comes in three-fold digipack with glued-in, 40-page booklet featuring liner notes, credits, info on the artists, and band photos.