Renowned diva Kathleen Battle sings the Handel aria “Let the Bright Seraphim,” assisted by Wynton Marsalis on trumpet.
***from the album “Classic Kathleen Battle: A Portrait” by Kathleen Battle
Soprano Roberta Alexander (b.1949) singing the art song Life and Death by African-American composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912).
***from the album “Songs My Mother Taught Me” by Roberta Alexander
Ka ‘Ba. Poem by Imamu Amiri Baraka (b.1934)
A closed window looks down
on a dirty courtyard, and black people
call across or scream or walk across
defying physics in the stream of their will
Our world is full of sound
Our world is more lovely than anyone’s
tho we suffer, and kill each other
and sometimes fail to walk the air
We are beautiful people
with African imaginations
full of masks and dances and swelling chants
with African eyes, and noses, and arms,
though we sprawl in grey chains in a place
full of winters, when what we want is sun.
We have been captured,brothers. And we labor
to make our getaway, intothe ancient image, into a new
correspondence with ourselves
and our black family. We read magic
now we need the spells, to rise up
return, destroy, and create. What will be
the sacred words?
A third setting of the Langston Hughes poem, The Negro Speaks of Rivers, this time composed by Howard Swanson and performed by bass-baritone Oral Moses.
***from the album “Oral Moses Sings Songs of America” by Oral Moses.
(Source: twistedsincerity)
Another version of The Negro Speaks of Rivers, composed by Howard Swanson and performed by tenor Darryl Taylor. The poem by Langston Hughes is one that is frequently set by African-American composers. This arrangement is from Thompson’s song cycle of settings of Hughes poetry, “Dream Variations” for voice and piano.
***from the album “Poetry Prelude: The Music of Richard Thompson,” featuring Darryl Taylor and Louise Toppin.
