Joel Ross: ‘Gospel Music’

The joyous nature of jazz comes to the fore with vibes-supremo Joel Ross’s release ‘Gospel Music’ on Blue Note Records.

Ross’s fifth Blue Note album, there’s a reason this musician continues to perform at the top of his game: the intricacy of writing and performing on the opening track - Wisdom is Eternal (for Barry Harris) - weaves sounds in and out of each other that is almost mesmerising. Watch the official video and it’s even more breathtaking as the melody wanders between the instruments.

The whole album takes faith and the bible and delivers a message of hope and love through music. It features a sextet version of Ross’s Good Vibes band alongside the leader’s vibrophone: Josh Johnson (alto sax), Maria Grand (tenor sax), Jeremy Corren (piano), Kanoa Mendenhall (bass) and Jeremy Dutton (drums).

Ross’s compositions often create a groove that uses the ensemble as a whole to set the tone, before his vibes take the improvisation and open it up for others. Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) canters along with a complexity that nevertheless allows individual solos to shine.

Gospel Music uses jazz to tell the biblical story of creation, the fall, and salvation, corresponding to biblical texts that Ross includes in the liner notes. At the center of it is the desire that we meditate on the meaning of the ultimate sacrifice that defines a faith in Christ that calls on its practitioners to love God and others.

Ross makes sound a meditative space that allows the band to reflect on each other’s playing. He says: “If there's anything I do talk to the band about, it's about that, making sure we're making space for everyone and supporting everyone. Because that's what we're supposed to do.

He says of the album: “This is probably the boldest example of trying to share what I believe is the good news as well as in homage to where I'm coming from.”

If you listen to one track, make it The Giver, which takes lyrics from the James Baldwin poem The Giver (for Berdis) sung by Andy Louis. Less complex than many of the other tracks, the simplicity brings clarity to the message.

Complexity, meditation and Ross’s faith all come together in jazz that encourages us to stand aside from the world and listen. Whatever each one of us takes from Gospel Music seems deeply rooted in faith and the sounds of a Chicago church as well as a collaborative recording studio.

Check out Joel Ross live if you can while he’s touring the US and Europe this spring.