CONCERT REVIEWS
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Jill Scott grooves at the Hard Rock |
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BY JOAN CARTWRIGHT |
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[Hollywood, FL - October 26, 2007] Jill
Scott is changing the face of women around the world! The
2007 Baileys Get Together with Jill Scott kicked off in
Houston on Oct. 23 before coming to the Hard Rock. Other
awards Scott has won are Soul Train, NAACP Image Awards and
Brit Awards. |
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Last Updated ( Friday, 2 November 2007 ) |
ARCHIVED ARTICLES
Queen Latifah relinquishes Hip Hop
for Jazz and Blues
BY JOAN CARTWRIGHT
The
tall, tom-boyish Hip Hop princess in a baby blue track suit walked
into the small restaurant in Greenwich Village, New York City, with
her father the night I sang with famed tenor player Lou Donaldson at
the Village Vanguard.
Never did I dream that this young lady would grace the stage of the
Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts in West Palm Beach
several years later, singing jazz standards.
But Queen Latifah has made the shift from rap music to jazz and
blues, and it is Simply Beautiful!
Her nine-piece band consists of two brothers in the rhythm section
on acoustic and electric bass and drums, two keyboardists, a
percussionist and three horns – flute/sax, trumpet and trombone.
Born Dana Elaine Owens on March 18, 1970, Latifah (which means
“gentle’’ or “kind’’ in Arabic) proves that tradition continues
among great African-American song stylists. The three background
singers, Mayana, Charlotte and Romeo, are exquisite! They never
overshadow Queen’s lead, but they blow dynamic riffs, when she
presents them.
Queen opened Wednesday night with I’m Gonna Live Till I Die,
in the big band flavor used by stars like Natalie Cole, Liza Minelli
and Barbra Streisand.
She followed with an all-time favorite, I Love Being Here With
You. Then, she asked permission to sing a blues song titled,
Baby Get Lost, causing me to ask “Is she Bessie Smith or
Ethel Waters reincarnated?”
“I’m taking you on a “musical journey,” she describes it, when she
calls for the band to play it “funky” on Why You Wanna Make Me
Cry?
“Now,” I think, “this girl is doing a musical revue!”
After getting Derrick to rip the funk on his electric bass, she
calls Mad Money Mike out to jam on his guitar.
Then, she introduces her CD, also the title of her tour,
Trav’lin’ Light. She does breathy covers, including the
beautiful ballad, Georgia Rose. On the CD, Stevie Wonder plays
harmonica. Onstage, the muted trumpet solo is real music to my ears!
The song is a tribute to black women. Queen sings to them, “Don’t be
blue ‘cause you’re black!”
Next, she sings the airy title tune Trav’lin’ Light,
featuring the trombonist, pianist and keyboardist on string ensemble
that was as free as a breeze.
From her recent film, a remake of Hairspray, she sang I
Know Where I’ve Been. The lyric says she has “Pride in my heart
‘cause I know where I’m going and I know where I’ve been.” This song
succeeded in doing what it was written to do, “Lift us up to
tomorrow.”
Plugging Cover Girl, the Procter & Gamble cosmetics line
that hired Latifah as its spokeswoman, the consummate celebrity –
who starred in the movie Beauty Shop – stops to freshen her
lipstick, saying, “I sing that song so hard, my lips get dry!”
During every show, she “must say something silly and funny because
life is too serious as it is.”
Then, she brings her dad, Lance Owens, onstage. He welcomes the West
Palm Beach audience and thanks us for supporting his daughter. Queen
thanks him “for making me!”
We get a kick out of that as she talks about the next song, which
passed “the Mommy Test.” When her mother, Rita, heard Poetry Man,
she liked it. Dana says, “We cool like that!”
It’s obvious that she’s comfortable onstage and we’re comfortable
with her. Of course, there are those fans that she calls “Hip Hop
Heads” who want to hear her rap. But she doesn’t go there because,
after all, she’s Trav’lin’ Light.”
Her ballads are soft and pretty, especially Phoebe Snow’s beautiful
composition Poetry Man, featuring the background singers.
Latifah’s voice is breathy, as her keyboardist smoothes everything
over with the string ensemble.
I’m wondering “where is the hip hopping teen that rose to the top of
the charts like a big, bright balloon?”
Then, my brother, Carlton, who joined me at the concert, reminds me
that “she’s a movie star” and I get it. She’s diverse and universal!
Behind me, a lady named Lola wants Queen to sing U.N.I.T.Y.,
the Grammy Award-winning hit song from Queen’s 1993 Black Reign
Hip Hop album. The song famously denounced the B-word and demanded
respect for all women, helping to establish Queen as one of the top
female Hip Hop artists of all time.
But on this night, Queen doesn’t do U.N.I.T.Y., or any
other rap song. Instead, she breaks into Mercy, Mercy, Mercy
by Cannonball Adderly, a real stretch from Hip Hop! Now, the light
show has caught my eye and I’m appreciating the lighting technician.
Queen says, “We’ve done some jazz, blues and funk for you. But, West
Palm Beach, can we get soulful with you?”
People scream out, “Do Marvin Gaye!”
She stops short and asks, “Who ya’ll come to see?”
There’s laughter as she and Romeo, the male voice in the background,
break into Al Green’s Real Love.
Each singer takes a solo. Romeo is phenomenal, Charlotte can “sang!”
and Mayana’s soprano riffs are “simply beautiful!”
Latifah declares their virtuosity and assures us that she is “100
percent natural.”
And she is. There’s no pretense. You know they’ve rehearsed because
the music is meticulous with harmonies indicative of what black
music is, “simply beautiful.”
Then, she takes us for a loop. She introduces her next cover,
California Dreamin’. If Poetry Man didn’t take us back
to flower children and peace signs, this song surely did. This
classic, written by The Mamas and The Papas, was recorded and
popularized by guitarists Jose Feliciano and Wes Montgomery.
Latifah claims the song with her classic voice and artistic band,
joined by one of South Florida’s jazz icons,
Cuban trumpeter Arturo Sandoval, whose style is a cross between
Dizzy Gillespie and Maynard Ferguson. It is moments like this that
authenticate younger artists in pursuit of jazz melodies. This was a
bit of history happening before our eyes – a moment you’d say, “You
had to be there!”
Sandoval jammed with the horn section, while Latifah played the
bongos. The crowd loved the mix. Latifah made the Peace sign on each
hand, thanked the musicians and us for letting her “live her dream,
onstage” and exited stage right.
We called her back, not expecting what was in store. I was surprised
and I know that Carmen McRae, who sang this song years ago, and
Johnny Hartman who recorded it with John Coltrane, were smiling down
from that big bandstand in the sky.
The song was Lush Life, and her version was simply
beautiful, convincing me that Queen Latifah may be a novice in jazz,
but she knows where many of us have been and, definitely, where
she’s going.
Divajc47@Yahoo.com
Photo: Queen Latifah, shot by Sayre Berman.
Last Updated (
Friday, 9 November 2007)
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