NEW RELEASES: MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO – VENTRILOQUISM; ROBERT GLASPER EXPERIMENT: LIVE; SUSAN KREBS CHAMBER BAND – SPRING: LIGHT OUT OF DARKNESS

MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO – VENTRILOQUISM

Some albums are testimony, some confessions and some are escape. Ventriloquism, the latest album from Meshell Ndegeocello, is a place, like its process, to take refuge from one storm too many. Ventriloquism has the hallmarks of all of Ndegeocello’s work, lush and investigative, subversive and sublime. As always, she pays tribute to her diverse influences in these eleven covers. Meshell chose art for the album package that hints at what’s inside: A graphic V, a hidden M, the artwork is symbolic, sexy, and calls on the language of protest of the era from which these songs were mined.

ROBERT GLASPER – ROBERT GLASPER EXPERIMENT: LIVE (DVD)

On their star-studded, chart-topping Black Radio albums, Robert Glasper Experiment laid out a new paradigm for creative music, reaching beyond entrenched genre boundaries to create a singular vision that draws from all reaches of contemporary black music and beyond. The concert film Robert Glasper Experiment - Live features the 2-time Grammy-winning band in their element, capturing the thrilling, genre-defying group live on stage from New York and Los Angeles to Shanghai and Rotterdam. This program presents favorite songs from the Black Radio albums and more with special guests including Lalah Hathaway, Bilal, Wayne Brady, B. Slade, Algebra Blessett, and the Metropole Orchestra conducted by Vince Mendoza. 

SUSAN KREBS CHAMBER BAND – SPRING: LIGHT OUT OF DARKNESS

Spring: Light Out of Darkness is Susan Krebs' sixth album as a leader and the second recording project for the Susan Krebs Chamber Band. The idea for the jazz chamber band grew from salons hosted by jazz vocalist Krebs at her home, in which she and a small group of her close friends get together in front of an invited audience to explore various motifs through wide-ranging music, poetry and improvisation. The overarching concept that binds the seven tunes on this CD is renewal. Like many people, Krebs is concerned about the problems that beset our country and, indeed, the whole world. For Krebs, change has to begin on a personal level. She connects to the world both as a musical artist and as a serious gardener, attuned to the rhythms of the natural world.  Joined by some of the finest jazz players in Southern California, the album comprises a mix of musical genres imbued with a jazz sensibility. “SPRING ~ Light Out of Darkness” is infused with a reverence for nature, and, as with all of Krebs’ recordings and live performances, it is also filled with her hopeful vision and generous soul.