The Great Debaters Soundtrack

<img src="http://www.qromag.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/thegreatdebaterssoundtrack.jpg" alt=" " />Sharon Jones, Alvin ‘Youngblood’ Hart and more perform a wide-ranging collection of blues, gospel, and jazz pieces from long ago for Denzel Washington’s <em>The Great...
7.3 Atlantic
2007 

 Sharon Jones, Alvin ‘Youngblood’ Hart and more perform a wide-ranging collection of blues, gospel, and jazz pieces from long ago for Denzel Washington’s The Great Debaters. The Academy Award®-winning Washington personally chose the selection of pre-1935 songs as director and star of The Great Debaters, enlisting top talent to deliver some stirring renditions of some classic material.  While the quality varies, depending on what you like, there’s a soulful core throughout this soundtrack.

The Great Debaters tells the story of Professor Melvin Tolson, who led and inspired the debate team from a small African-American college to historic heights in pre-war, segregationist Dixie.  While the achievements of a debate team might not match Jesse Owens at the 1936 Berlin Olympics at first glance, the soundtrack delves deep into the traditional music of the Deep South, from stripped-down blues to big band showstoppers to civil rights marching songs.

Most of The Great Debaters Soundtrack centers on the many sides of Grammy Award-winning blues singer/guitarist Alvin ‘Youngblood’ Hart.  He delivers world-wise humor on “Step It Up and Go” and rollicking post-revival stomp on “City of Refuge”.  There’s the deep fiddle blues on “I’ve Got Blood In My Eyes For You”, harmonicas on “Busy Bootin’”, and straight-up Youngblood and Youngblood alone on “How Long Before I Change My Clothes”.  But his vocals might be strongest on his rendition of Blind Willie Johnson’s “Nobody’s Fault But Mine”.

The other major force on the soundtrack is Brooklyn’s own soul diva, Sharon Jones.  Best known for her work with the Dap-Kings, including this year’s 100 Days, 100 Nights (QRO review), Jones shows off her impressive pipes right from the start, in the driving, pressing, revival blues of “My Soul Is A Witness” with Hart.  The Hart-Jones combo hit up a walking blues with the following “That’s What My Baby Likes”, bigger on “It’s Tight Like That”, lo-fi choral with “Two Wings”, and a laid-back, though somewhat simplistic, vibe on “Wild About That Thing”.  Jones also goes gospel near the end, with Billy Rivers and the Angelic Voices of Faith, on the proto-civil rights anthem “We Shall Not Be Moved”, but is maybe best on the classic gospel traditional, “Up Above My Head”, as the song moves from a soft uplift to bringing the house down.

The few tracks that are not associated with Hart and/or Jones are more fitting with the period, but lack the power of the rest of the album.  David Berger & the Sultans of Swing have a nice rendition of Duke Ellington’s “Delta Serenade” and the big-band-y “Rock n’ Rye”.  And The Great Debaters Soundtrack concludes with two period recordings, the ‘piano rag from some silent movie’ “The Shout” by Art Tatum (where you can literally hear the needle on the gramophone record), and German opera piece “Begrussung” by Marian Anderson.  While certainly ‘of the era’, the four tracks don’t quite fit with the rest of the album.

Denzel Washington’s biopics have often had a hook into music, whether he’s playing the subject of Bob Dylan’s “The Hurricane” or giving legions of rappers a role model as Malcolm X.  With The Great Debaters, he goes even further back in time, touching upon a wide swath of America’s musical roots, blue, jazz, gospel, and more.  And thanks to Alvin ‘Youngblood’ Hart, Sharon Jones, and others, that music gets brought into today.

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