D.D. Jackson – Poetry Project

Poetry Project represents an exciting new chapter in the Canadian-born, New York-area based, Juno and multi-Emmy-winning jazz pianist/composer/producer D.D. Jackson’s extremely varied musical career. In his youth, the prodigious Jackson was already performing with orchestras by the age of 13, followed later by the classical music rigors of Indiana University, and then a pivot to jazz and NYC – first at the prestigious Manhattan School of Music for his Masters (as a student of legendary jazz pianist Jaki Byard), and then as a student of  the great Don Pullen (the two of them both alumni of the historic bands of Charles Mingus). Pullen subsequently introduced him to a litany of jazz legends with whom he would go on to play, record, and tour the world, from David Murray (with whom Jackson was first “discovered” at his debut at the Montreal Jazz Festival), to Billy Bang and (later) even Questlove and The Roots.

After a prolific output of 13 CD’s as leader or co-leader featuring largely original material (on Canada’s Justin Time and two albums on the major label BMG), Jackson made a sharp pivot as he settled down with family and launched what ultimately became a multi-Emmy-winning career writing for television (including for such renowned children’s shows as The Wonder Pets, Peg + Cat, and Sesame Street), while also earning accolades as an award-winning professor at such institutes as Brooklyn College, the Harlem School of the Arts, and NYU.

The spark to return to his jazz performing/composing roots came in 2021 during the shelter-in-place times of the pandemic, when Canada’s former Poet Laureate George Elliott Clarke (with whom Jackson had previously composed two jazz-influenced operas) commissioned Jackson to write a song (“Self-Composed”) based upon a poem Clarke had written for his daughter. George would go on to send D.D. a set of 13 curated poem collections over the ensuing months from a diverse set of Canadian poets, from which Jackson would choose the ideal poem from each to bring to life in song. The response to the resulting song collection was so electric that Jackson was compelled to apply for – and ultimately received – a Canada Council Concept to Realization Grant to record what has now become this Poetry Project.

Featuring 5 Juno-winning performers (including Jackson himself and vocalists Laila Biali and Sammy Jackson), Snarky Puppy drummer Larnell Lewis, and other cream-of-the-crop Canadian talent from soprano saxophonist Jane Bunnett to bassists Rich Brown and George Koller, and augmented by everything from string quartet to full orchestra, Poetry Project is a culminating, summarizing event, a synthesis of all that Jackson has learned on his multi-faceted journey, and also an exciting promise of what’s to come.

Instrumentalists:

• D.D. Jackson – Bosendorfer piano, Rhodes, Wurlitzer and organ
• Larnell Lewis – drums (tracks 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 9, 10, 12)
• George Koller – acoustic bass (1, 3, 9, 10)
• Rich Brown – el. bass (2, 4, 7, 12)
• Tom Fleming – guitars (2, 7, 12)
• Jane Bunnett – soprano sax (1)
• Kelly Jefferson – tenor sax (7)
• Curtis Stewart – violin (10)
• String Quartet (6) with: Camille Vogley-Howes – 1st vln; Lana Auerbach – 2nd vln; Kayla Williams – viola, & Raffi Boden – cello
• The Czech National Symphony Orchestra (13), and more.

Vocalists:

• Laila Biali (track 1)
• Sammy Jackson (2, 9)
• Yoon Sun Choi (3, 10)
• Ethan Cronin (4)
• John Lindsay-Botten (5, 8)
• D.D. Jackson (6, 13)
• Dean Bowman (7, 12)
• Raina Sokolov-Gonzalez (11)

Lyrics: Canadian poets Bruce Meyer (track 1), Giovanna Riccio (2, 13), Micheline Maylor (3), Luciano Iacobelli (4), Irving Layton (5), Libby Scheier (6), George Elliott Clarke (7, 8), Ayesha Chatterjee (9), Choucri Paul Zemokhol (11), Al Moritz (12), and Chinese poet Yin Xiaoyuan (10).

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