Jazz at The Lincoln Center Orchestra

• 2-CD + DVD

• INCLUDES 60-PAGE BOOKLET

• 4 STARS ALL MUSIC GUIDE

In 2008, nine-time GRAMMY® Award winner Wynton Marsalis was commissioned to write a piece commemorating the 200th anniversary of Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church. The result was a sacred celebration: a sweeping composition for a big band and 70-piece gospel choir. In 2013, award-winning recording artist Damien Sneed and his choir, Chorale Le Chateau, joined the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis for a 16-city, 19-concert tour across the South that took the musicians into deep dialogue with the African American tradition. Now, The Abyssinian Mass—Marsalis’s first original recorded composition in six years—documents this piece’s immense power to make audiences clap their hands and sing along to its joyous spirituality, its profound swing, and its bluesy swagger.

This landmark double album also includes a new essay from renowned public intellectual Leon Wieseltier and a bonus DVD documentary that features performances, interviews, and insights into the process behind The Abyssinian Mass. The album’s exploration of the African American experience places it in the tradition of Marsalis’s Pulitzer Prize-winning composition and record Blood on the Fields. As ??The Abyssinian Mass? reminds us, “In this great land of ours, everyone has a place.” No matter your faith or background, The Abyssinian Mass is a sprawling, soulful triumph and a swinging affirmation of just how good being human can feel.

PERSONNEL:

• REEDS:
• SHERMAN IRBY
• TED NASH
• VICTOR GOINES
• WALTER BLANDING
• PAUL NEDZELA
• TRUMPETS:
• RYAN KISOR
• KENNY RAMPTON
• MARCUS PRINTUP
• WYNTON MARSALIS
• TROMBONES:
• VINCENT GARDNER
• CHRIS CRENSHAW
• ELLIOT MASON
• RHYTM SECTION:
• DAN NIMMER, piano
• CARLOS HENRIQUEZ, bass
• ALI JACKSON , drums

Recorded live on October 24th, 25th, and 26th 2013 at Frederick P, Rose Hall.

TRACKS:

• CD ONE:
• 01. Devotional
• 02. Call to Worship
• 03. The Lord's Prayer
• 04. Processional: "We Are on Our Way"
• 05. Invocation and Chant
• 06. Responsive Reading, Matthew 5: 3-12: The Beatitudes
• 07. Gloria Patri
• 08. Prayer: "Pastoral Prayer"
• 09. Choral Response: "Through Him I've Come to See"
• 10. Anthem: "Glory to God in the Highest"

• CD TWO:
• 11. Scripture: Isaiah 56: 7
• 12. Meditation: "Lord Have Mercy"
• SERMON: "THE UNIFYING POWER OF PRAYER "
• 13. Pt. I: "This House Is God's House"
• 14. Pt. II: "The Power of Prayer"
• 15. Pt. III "Everyone Has a Place"