Rhapsodies in Black: Music and Words From the Harlem Renaissance at Music Hills.com

Music CD 1

Negro Speaks of Rivers - Quincy Jones
Cotton Club Stomp - Duke Ellington
Harlem Strut - James P. Johnson
Brother Low Down - Bert Williams
Letter from Aaron Douglas to Langston Hughes
There'll Be Some Changes Made - Ethel Waters
Sounds of Africa - Eubie Blake
Sweet Man O' Mine - Mamie Smith
Weary Blues - Branford Marsalis
Blues Ain't Nothin' Else But! - Ida Cox
Kansas City Main Blues - Clarence Williams' Blue Five
Indianola
Hard Hearted Hannah - Rosa Henderson
Sonnet to a Negro in Harlem
St. Louis Blues - Bessie Smith
Copenhagen - Fletcher Henderson
Cake Walking Babies from Home - Clarence Williams' Blue Five
Long Gone - Darius Rucker
Railroad Blues - Trixie Smith

Music CD 2

Smoke, Lillies and Jade! - Carl Hancock Rux
(Lookie, Lookie, Lookie) Here Comes Cookie - Cleo Brown
Charleston - Paul Whiteman
Chili Pepper - Fred Longshaw
Lucy Long - Perry Bradford's Jazz Phools
Chain Gang Blues - Ma Rainey
Mother to Son - Sylvia Rhone
Deep River - Paul Robeson
East St. Louis Toodle-Oo - Duke Ellington
Lazy Drag - Thomas Morris
How It Feels to Be Colored Me - Debbie Allen
Sengalese Stomp
After You've Gone - Paul Whiteman
Dead Drunk Blues - Margaret Johnson
No Images - Lou Rawls
Woke Up With the Blues in My Fingers - Lonnie Johnson
Worried Blues - Gladys Bentley
Humpty Dumpty - Frankie Trumbauer
Ham and Eggs - Johnny Dunn
Sugar - Alberta Hunter

Music CD 3

If We Must Die - Ice-T,
Honey, I'm All out and Down - Leadbelly
My Handy Man - Victoria Spivey
Ain't Misbehavin' - Louis Armstrong
Handful of Riffs - Blind Willie Dunn, Lonnie Johnson
Bright Boy Blues - Cecil Scott
Debt - Joshua Redman
Harlem Fuss - Fats Waller
Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out - Bessie Smith
Fare Thee Honey Blues - James P. Johnson & his Orchestra
Soon - Gregory Hines
Smashing Thirds - Fats Waller
Do Shuffle - Fess Williams
Wherever There's a Will There's a Way - McKinney's Cotton Pickers
Dee Blues - The Chocolate Dandies
Odyssey of Big Boy - Chuck D
Minnie the Moocher - Cabell "Cab" Calloway
Panama - Luis Russell
Royal Garden Blues - Ted Lewis
America - August Wilson
Jesus Gonna Make up My Dying Bed - Josh White

Music CD 4

I Want to Die While You Love Me - Alfre Woodard
Stormy Weather - Ethel Waters
Corrine, Corrina - Cabell "Cab" Calloway
Sweetie Dear - Sidney Bechet
Damnation of Women - LeVar Burton
Baby! - Duke Ellington, Adelaide Hall
Happy as the Day Is Long - Harold Arlen, Leo Reisman
I Got Rhythm
Let's Get Together - Chick Webb
Their Eyes Were Watching God
Oh, Lady Be Good
Symphony in Riffs - Benny Carter, Benny Carter
Sendin' the Vipers - Mezz Mezzrow
Down South Camp Meeting - Fletcher Henderson, Fletcher Henderson
Day Breakers - Coolio
She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain - Tiny Bradshaw
Minor Mania - Claude Hopkins
Sensemayá - Chant for Killing a Snake - Eartha Kitt
Symphony in Black - Duke Ellington
Echoes of Spring - Willie "The Lion" Smith
(Lookie, Lookie, Lookie) Here Comes Cookie - Teddy Hill
Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain - George Duke
It Never Dawned on Me - Teddy Wilson
Honey Dripper Blues - Georgia White
I'm in the Mood for Love - Louis Armstrong

Music reviews of Rhapsodies in Black: Music and Words From the Harlem Renaissance

Music Review: Amazing, simply amazing
Rating: 5 Stars

Description of Rhapsodies in Black: Music and Words From the Harlem Renaissance

Rhapsodies reaches back to 1918 for Wilbur C. Sweatman's Original Jazz Band and their recording of "Indianola," and it gathers in poems and excerpts from stories and essays, read by such luminaries as Quincy Jones, Public Enemy's Chuck D, Branford Marsalis, and Angela Bassett. Musically, the collection focuses in some depth on early jazz and the first iteration of "urban blues." Bessie Smith's 1925 "St. Louis Blues," Duke Ellington's 1929 "Cotton Club Stomp" and 1926 "East St. Louis Toodle-Oo," Fats Waller's 1929 "Harlem Fuss" and "Smashing Thirds," Cab Calloway's 1931 "Minnie the Moocher," and Louis Armstrong's 1929 performance of Waller's "Ain't Misbehavin'" all stand out indelibly.

Along with the famous tunes are lots of underappreciated gems. Guitarist Lonnie Johnson's 1927 "Woke Up with Blues in My Fingers" is an awesome solo guitar showing. Also tremendous are early looks at future jazz giants Coleman Hawkins and Benny Carter, the former on Don Redman's "Wherever There's a Will, Baby" (from a 1929 McKinney's Cotton Pickers session) and the pair together on the Chocolate Dandies' 1930 "Dee Blues." The political core of the movement is alive here, too, with Claude McKay's "America" read by playwright August Wilson. Georgia Douglas Johnson's "I Want You to Die While You Love Me" and Helene Johnson's "Sonnet to a Negro in Harlem" (read by Bassett and Alfre Woodard, respectively) capture the poetic spirit from a woman's perspective, and Zora Neale Hurston's "Their Eyes Were Watching God" and "How It Feels to Be Colored Me" are read by Veronica Chambers and Debbie Allen. --Andrew Bartlett