Mark Turner: ‘Reflections on: The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man’

Tenor sax player Mark Turner has released Reflections on: The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man - a powerful commentary on important social issues for our time.

Inspired by the James Weldon Johnson book The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, Turner has composed a suite that juxtaposes spoken extracts from the book alongside fine, complex and intricate modern jazz.

The book is a semi-fictional account, set in post-Reconstruction America, of a biracial man able to ‘pass’ as white. Turner says: "I hadn't ever read a book that talked about passing before. At least I hadn't read one that talked about passing that was written that early on. In my family, we talked about that all the time because my mother can pass. Also my great aunts did exactly what the protagonist does in the book."

The music stands alone as a modern jazz quintet, but the links to the book are clear. Each composition is titled with allusions to the book's chronology and the piano quotes Lift Every Voice and Sing (also written by Johnson) towards the conclusion.

Reflections on: The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man was premiered at New York’s Village Vanguard in 2018. Alongside Turner’s virtuosic tenor sax are David Virelles (piano and synths), Jason Palmer (trumpet), Matt Brewer (bass) and Nasheet Waits (drums).

The suite has a connection running through it and each song is connected by recurring themes that move between players. The wonderful Pulmonary Edema allows full flight to Turner’s sax, with some piano accompaniment where the moments they come together are visceral.

Synths on New York add a new dimension to the music and the quintet’s sound, contributing an edge that is somehow menacing. Deliberately, Turner is tapping into the work of bandleader Sun Ra, moving effortlessly from free opening to groove with trumpet and tenor running hand in hand.

The album is released by Giant Step Arts, founded by award-winning photographer and recording engineer Jimmy Katz and his wife Dena. Jimmy says: “Giant Step Arts exists to aid musicians in realizing their artistic dreams. It does not sell music and artists retain full rights to their music. We work tirelessly to raise funds with the goal of helping more musicians."

With Reflections on: The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, Turner balances music and message in an insightful and joyous whole, ending with the brief but insistent Closure that perhaps allows us to hope that sometime there will be a settling of some of the issues raised in Johnson’s book.