John Edwin Mason: Documentary, Motorsports, Photo History

Funky Friday: Gordon Parks, "Symphony for Shafted Souls"

Here's a post I never expected to write -- Funky Friday and Gordon Parks.

Until a couple of days ago, I would have told you that it was more likely that Barry Manilow would show up on a Friday than Gordon Parks.  As much as I admire him as a photographer, writer, and filmmaker, his music has never done much for me.  If you'd asked me to describe it, I'd have used words like "sappy," "sentimental," and "ersatz classical."

Well, yes.  And no.  Sometimes -- such as when he was forced to produce the soundtrack for Shaft's Big Score, the second of his films about the black private dick who's a sex machine with all the chicks, in only two weeks -- he came up with a real gem.  Can you dig it?

 

 

Gordon Parks, Symphony for Shafted Souls.  Soundtrack, Shaft's Big Score (1972).

Whatever you make of it, this music sure isn't ersatz classical.

Parks, the director, hadn't expected to write the soundtrack for the movie, but Isaac Hayes, who had won an Oscar for his work on the original Shaft, couldn't come to terms with the studio.  So Parks stepped in a the last minute, knowing that he had to capture something of Hayes' magic.  He did a pretty good job.

Here's what the funk and soul blog never enough rhodes has to say about Parks' effort:

Parks is an interesting composer working with great orchestrators.  He takes Hayes' funk, strings and brass template, and adds in subtle, shifting woodwind textures, developing and extending the pastiche riffs -- it's a true musical "sequel" to the original Shaft.

 

 

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Funky Friday: DJ Li'l Miss Dolemite, Part 2

This is the second time I've had the honor and privilege of featuring the fun and fabulous Li'l Miss Dolemite on Funky Friday.  I love the mixes that she puts together -- great grooves with sprinkling of the absurd.

"Up in Flames (What-a-Gas)" is especially trippy.  Enjoy.

 

 

 

Li'l Miss.

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Funky Friday: Isaac Hayes, Gordon Parks & "Shaft"

Bringing together three of my favorite things this Funky Friday:  Isaac Hayes, Gordon Parks, and Shaft.

Hayes was, of course, one of the legendary composers and performers of the Soul era.  Parks, in the '50s, '60s, and well into the '70s, was one of the best known photographers in America.  Despite his achievements as a photojournalist, he's probably remembered more as the director of Shaft, the most successful of the blaxplotation films of the '70s.

Over 40 years later, film is still a hoot, but the real magic is in the music -- without a doubt.  Check out the opening sequence below.

 

 

 

In the short video below, Parks and Hayes talk a little about how the music will create set the movie's tone, right from the beginning.  Then Hayes and company lay down an amazing groove.  Stay with it to the end -- the payoff is terrific.

 

 

 

And finally...  Well, words fail me, but I like it.  (Once again, hang in there.  It takes off at about 2:00.)

 

 

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Funky Friday: Brandee Younger & Afro-Harping -- A Winter JazzFest Preview

I've been looking forward to this for a very long time:

Tonight! Brandee Younger presents Afro-Harping: A Tribute to (the great) Dorothy Ashby, as part of Winter JazzFest 2013.

Location: Sullivan Hall, 214 Sullivan St., between Bleecker and West 3rd, in New York City. Time: 10:15pm. I'll be there. You should be, too. This cool video explains it all.

 

 

Winter JazzFest 2013 Preview: Afro-Harping (Brandee Younger).

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Funky Friday: Fontella Bass, 1940-2012

Fontella Bass, a singer who embraced styles as varied as gospel, pop, and experimental jazz, died yesterday.  She's best known for having recorded "Rescue Me," one of the most iconic R&B songs of the 1960s.  I still remember the giddy thrill that it gave me when I first heard it.  I was 11 and just beginning to understand the power and pleasure of music.

Even though she spent much of her career out of the limelight, Bass was no one-hit-wonder.  You can read more about her in obituaries in the Jazz Times and New York Times, and you can hear for yourself below.  (By the way, the last song, "Talking About Freedom," is a little-known that beautifully captures the spirit of the times.)

 

"Rescue Me," 1965.

 

Performing "Rescue Me" on the television show "Shindig," 1965.

 

"Our Day Will Come," 1966.

 

"Talking About Freedom," 1972.