old school
Soul Stirrers, “He’s Been a Shelter to Me” (Paul Foster, lead vocal), “I’m a Soldier” (Jimmy Outler, lead vocal), live (TV show), early 1960s
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When you’re playing baseball, on that field, it’s like your whole life, it’s your world and you don’t want to leave it. It was such a joy to be there, to be able to make decisions on your own: when to swing, when not to swing; when to run, when not to run. I felt this is the only place in the world where I could make my own decisions.
—Ernie Banks (1931-2015)
two takes
“Jesus Gave Me Water” (L. Campbell)
Original Five Blind Boys (Archie Brownlee, lead vocals), 1950
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Soul Stirrers (Sam Cooke, lead vocals), 1951
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art beat
Lee Friedlander (1934-), Young Tuxedo Brass Band, New Orleans, 1959
three takes
“His Eye Is on the Sparrow” (C. Martin, C. Gabriel)
Soul Stirrers (feat. R. H. Harris, lead vocals), recording, 1946
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Harmonizing Four (feat. Jimmy Jones, bass), recording, 1958
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Kathleen Battle, Vienna Symphony Orchestra (Michael Tilson Thomas, cond.), live, Vienna, 1983
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random thoughts: New Year’s resolution #2
Take nothing for granted.
sounds of Chicago
Before “A Change Is Gonna Come,” before “Chain Gang,” before “You Send Me,” before . . .
Soul Stirrers (feat. Sam Cooke [1931-1964])
“Touch the Hem of His Garment,” 1956
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“Nearer My God To Thee,” live, Los Angeles, 1955
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Gray hairs being plucked,
and from below my pillow
a cricket singing—Matsuo Basho (1644-1694; translated from Japanese by Sam Hamill)
Who wouldn’t want to go to such a heaven?
Soul Stirrers (feat. Jimmy Outler), “Listen to the Angels Sing,” TV show, early 1960s
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listening room: (some of) what’s playing
• The Dirtbombs, Ultraglide in Black (In the Red)
• Robert Glasper Experiment, Black Radio (Blue Note)
• Shabazz Palaces, Black Up (Sub Pop)
• Terrie Ex, Paal Nilssen-Love, Hurgu! (PNL Records)
• Anthony Braxton Quintet (Basel) 1977 (hatOLOGY)
• Miles Davis, Live in Europe 1967 (Sony Legacy)
• ICP Orchestra Performs Herbie Nichols & Thelonious Monk (ICP)
• George Lewis & The NOW Orchestra, The Shadowgraph Series: Compositions for Creative Orchestra (Spool)
• Misha Mengelberg, Steve Lacy, Goerge Lewis, Harjen Gorter, Han Bennink, Change of Season (Soul Note)
• Pharaoh Sanders, Karma (Impulse!)
• Charles “Bobo” Shaw & Lester Bowie, Bugle Boy Bop (Muse)
• Reverend Claude Jeter, Yesterday and Today (Shanachie)
• This May Be My Last Time Singing: Raw African-American Gospel On 45 RPM (1957-1982) (Tompkins Square)
• J. Berg’s A Cappella Archives (Vol. 3), Royal Rarities (Vol. 3) (Rare Gospel)
• Congotronics 2: Buzz ’n’ Rumble in the Urb ’n’ Jungle (Crammed Discs)
• Pandit Pran Nath, Midnight: Raga Malkauns (Just Dreams)
• Nikhil Banerjee, Afternoon Ragas (Bhimpalasri, Multani) (Raga Records)
• John Luther Adams, Songbird Songs (Mode Records)
• John Luther Adams, Clouds of Forgetting, Clouds of Unknowing (New World Records)
• John Cage Edition—Vol. 23: The Works for Violin 4 (Irvine Arditti, violin; Stephen Drury, piano) (Mode Records)
• Morton Feldman, Trio (Aki Takahashi, piano; Marc Sabat, violin; Rohan de Saram, cello) (Mode Records)
• Tristan Murail, Gondwana, Desintegrations, Time and Again (Disques Montaigne)
• Peter Serkin Plays the Music of Toru Takemitsu (RCA/BMG)
• The Incomparable Rudolf Serkin (Beethoven, Piano Sonatas Nos. 30, 31, 32) (Deutsche Grammophon)
• WKCR-FM (broadcasting from Columbia University)
—Bird Flight (Phil Schaap, jazz [Charlie Parker])
—Eastern Standard Time (Carter Van Pelt, Jamaican music)
• WFMU-FM
—Mudd Up! (DJ/Rupture, “new bass and beats”)
—Sinner’s Crossroads (Kevin Nutt, gospel)
—Cherry Blossom Clinic (Terre T, rock, etc.)
—Fool’s Paradise (Rex; “Vintage rockabilly, R & B, blues, vocal groups, garage, instrumentals, hillbilly, soul and surf”)
—Downtown Soulville (Mr. Fine Wine, soul, etc.)
Claude Jeter, Inez Andrews, Archie Brownlee, Dorothy Love Coates, this guy: where else can you find so many unforgettable voices?
Soul Stirrers (featuring R. H. Harris), “His Eye Is on the Sparrow” (1946)
Vodpod videos no longer available.**********
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When R. H. Harris, the renowned gospel tenor, died last month, I went back to the records he had made in the 1950’s with his quartet, the Soul Stirrers. Harris was the — founder is not too strong a word — of a soul singing that concentrated on supple phrasing and tonal sweetness. He could, as Tina Turner used to say, ”do it rough,” but there was a core of reticence, even melancholy in him. His roughness was strategic.
The Soul Stirrers set the mold for other outstanding quartets like the Swan Silvertones and the Five Blind Boys of Alabama, and for younger soul singers, from Sam Cooke (trained by Harris) to David Ruffin and Eddie Kendricks of the Temptations (Harris had mastered husky rhythm singing and falsetto), and Smokey Robinson and Marvin Gaye.
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The discipline required of a first-rate ensemble, vocal or instrumental, translates into the kind of musical discretion that comes only from intense on-the-spot listening. Not biding time or doing cute things onstage until your solo comes, but listening. Take melisma (one syllable stretched over many notes), the vocal weapon so battered and abused by pop singers today. Harris was a master of it. For him it was a musical resource, like dynamics or timbre, not a way of muscling listeners to the ground till they screamed and clapped, maybe because they were overpowered, maybe just to stop the madness.
The Soul Stirrers’ a cappella harmonies are deeply satisfying. And when Harris rises above them with his pure, true pitch (pitch is usually the missing element in today’s melisma mania), you will experience true bliss.
—Margo Jefferson, New York Times, 10/2/00
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The self never ages.
—Roland Barthes, Mourning Diary (trans. Richard Howard, 2010)
Someone could offer me a million dollars to forget this voice and I still couldn’t do it.
The Soul Stirrers featuring R.H. Harris
“Walk Around” (1939)
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“Lord I’ve Tried” (1946)
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“I Want To Rest” (1946)
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“I’m Willing To Run” (1947)
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“He [R.H. Harris] was The Man – the guy everyone tried to sound like,” says gospel historian Anthony Heilbut. “If you’ve been to a black church or listened to R&B music, you’ve heard the influence of R.H. Harris.”
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame made the Soul Stirrers its first gospel inductees in 1989.
Musically, Harris and the Soul Stirrers helped shape gospel’s transition from the old “jubilee” a cappella style into the “quartet” style, with a more distinct lead voice and musical parts.
Harris sang in a striking high voice Heilbut calls “a combination of gospel moans, cowboy yodels and a clear Irish tenor.”
Harris helped found the Soul Stirrers in Texas in the 1930s. When he left in 1950, Cooke took over as lead singer and always called Harris his major stylistic influence. He then passed the style to the likes of Al Green.—David Hinckley, New York Daily News, September 6, 2000 (obituary)
If you’re a gospel singer, any time—even (especially?) a sister’s funeral—is a time to sing.
Gene Stewart (of the Soul Stirrers) with Willie Rogers (also of the Soul Stirrers), “The Last Mile of the Way” (recorded by the Soul Stirrers, with Sam Cooke, in 1955), live
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Once you are a Soul Stirrer you are always a Soul Stirrer. Sam Cooke will always be known as a Soul Stirrer regardless of what he did in the world.—Willie Rogers
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Want more of the Soul Stirrers? Here (with Sam Cooke [10/4/09]).
music clip of the day 