HARLEM SOUNDS: ELLINGTON, MORAN, TEDDY RILEY, GREAT DAY

From the Apollo to the projects to 17 east 126th Street

Houston born pianist Jason Moran has lived in New York, especially Harlem, for many years now, absorbing the neighborhood’s musical history and becoming an advocate for that tradition as well as a brilliant extension of it. Last night at the Apollo he did a solo piano performance of Duke Ellington’s music that was sublime and transporting. That his exquisite touch was supported by various Gordon Parks photographs of Duke, his collaborator Billy Strayhorn and his band elevated an already heavenly experience. Above is Moran interpreting Ellington’s 1927 composition “Black and Tan Fantasy.”

Producer, songwriter and R&B innovator Teddy Riley is a child of Harlem, who learned music in local churches and was adopted by uptown gangsters as a youngster. His new jack swing sound (named by a another Harlemite, writer Barry Michael Cooper, revolutionized black popular music in the late ‘80s, building a bridge between singing and rapping that dominated radio and inspired scores of hit records. Above Teddy tells part of his original story and how a robbery at his original studio forced him to record out of his parent’s Harlem apartment. Below is a Follow the Sound episode recorded outside that very 129th Street apartment building.

I’m deep into a crowd funding campaign for a documentary set in Harlem about the greatest photo in hip hop history, one taken by Gordon Parks himself. See the video for details and a link below where you can contribute.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/a-great-day-in-hip-hop-the-film/x/11010058#/

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/a-great-day-in-hip-hop-the-film/x/11010058#/