Wadada Leo Smith - Procession of the Great Ancestry (Chief/Nessa, 1989)

 This post is by Dan

Wadada Leo Smith (t, flhn, kmba; vo); Bobby Naughton (vib); Joe Fonda (b); Kahil El Zabar (d, blfn; kmba, perc); Louis Myers (el. g on 2 tracks only); Mchaka Uba (el. b on 2 tracks only); John Powell (ts on "Nuru Light: The Prince of Peace")

Recorded February 28, 1983

Ishmael Wadada Leo Smith was known simply as Leo Smith before his conversion to Rastafarianism. Although he continues to record, write, and teach in his 80s, I find his work in the late 1970s and early 1980s to be not only immensely enjoyable to hear but also crucial to the development of jazz beyond bebop and fusion. The music still communicates directly and is a great representation of what is sometimes now called "spiritual jazz."  

Procession of the Great Ancestry captures Smith simultaneously looking ahead and backward. Five of the seven compositions are dedications to the ancestors: Miles Davis, Booker Little, Roy Eldridge, Dizzy Gillespie, and Martin Luther King. These tributes tend to be long forms built loosely around thematic material in which Smith's trumpet converses with Kahil El Zabar's percussion (including kalimba), Bobby Naughton's vibes, and Joe Fonda's arco bass. Two shorter pieces, "Blues: Jah Jah is the Perfect Love" and "Who Killed David Walker?" are vocals by Smith and include electric guitar and bass. These are brief departures from the overall mood of the album. 

Procession was recorded in Chicago, then sat in the can for six years before it was released on Chief Records in the UK. Twenty years later, it was reissued on CD on the Nessa label in the U.S. The original Chief cover art is the photo of the trumpeter in the studio; the reissue cover (below) sends a different vibe. Producer Chuck Nessa was responsible for the original recording and both of the CD releases. 

Two other albums by Smith in this same period are also favorites of mine. Both Divine Love (ECM, 1979) and Spirit Catcher (Nessa, 1979) include long-form pieces while focusing less on backward glances toward tradition. These albums opened up many possibilities for both composition and improvisation, particularly the use of space and mystical sounding tonalities rather than rapid-fire soloing that characterizes much bebop. The effect is indeed spiritual, however you chose to define that term.