Inspiration moves easily through jazz, blues, and gospel.
Ronja Music
Yoron Israel – Drums, Percussion, Vibraphone, Leader, Producer; Leah Hinton – Vocals; Laszlo Gardony – Piano; Avery Sharpe – Electric & Acoustic Bass; Ian Buss – Tenor & Soprano Saxophone; Rick Peckham – Guitar; Dennis Montgomery – Hammond B3 Organ
Inspiration is a record built from two lives that Yoron Israel has apparently never experienced as separate. He has spent nearly four decades as one of jazz’s most reliable drummers, the kind of player whose name turns up in the credits of records led by Ahmad Jamal, Sonny Rollins, Abbey Lincoln, and Roy Hargrove, among others. He’s also the Pastor of Music and Arts at Destiny Life Center International Church in Brockton, Massachusetts.
Inspiration, Israel’s eighth album as a leader, opens with its title track, a Kenny Werner composition reworked as a vibraphone-piano duo with longtime collaborator Laszlo Gardony. The vibraphone notes ring out from the start, hanging in the air. It’s a pretty melody, simple, the kind of tune you could hum along with on first listen. There’s a countermelody coming from the vibes in the lower register. Combine that with the piano melody and it sounds bigger than a duo.
The drums kick the door open on “Black Scholars” — sticks cracking clean off the heads — and the rest of the band comes in like they were just waiting for the invitation. Piano and tenor sax fall in together first, and Peckham’s guitar keeps slipping in counterpoint underneath. The piano solo bounces along, and Sharpe takes his turn on bass with Gardony comping close behind him. The drums come back harder with cymbals shimmering, guitar and sax trading short phrases over the top.
Guitar opens “Mirror Mirror/Man in the Mirror” — a mashup pairing Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” with Chick Corea’s “Mirror, Mirror.” The Hammond B3 purrs underneath, sax and piano working the melody before singer Leah Hinton enters quietly, Ian Buss’s sax right there with her. Later in the track her voice opens up — she leans into the lyrics, there’s a rasp at the edges and the soulful bend owes as much to neo-soul as it does to jazz. Peckham closes it out with a coda of perfectly placed single notes.
A masterful show of drums opens “A Brand New Joy.” It’s playful — you hear something sounding like a ball bouncing down the stairs — before piano and guitar settle in, and the song starts to build toward something. A pause, some cymbals, and the tempo shifts — Hinton’s voice is lighter, more buoyant. She’s playing with the lyrics now, slurs a few words, works a little vibrato in. The tenor sax takes the solo laid-back and cool, hanging behind the beat like it’s in no hurry to leave.
Delicate jingling, tapping percussion open “The Island” with soprano sax floating over it and simple piano lines underneath. It’s Israel’s take on a tune by Brazilian composer Ivan Lins, one he’s said he’s come to hear as a portrait of a long marriage. Hinton’s vocal enters dreamy, laid-back, unmistakably romantic — she’s singing to someone she loves. When she scats near the end, sliding the syllables around before landing back on the words, you can hear just how comfortable she is staying inside the emotion of the song.
A slick walking bass line pushes “No Greater Love” into hard-bop territory, drums understated and Hinton easily riding the groove on this well-known standard. By song’s end you can hear the urgency in her voice, especially on that line the song is named for: there’s no greater love for you.
Organ and sax open “It’s All About You, Lord,” and then it’s just Hinton’s voice, everyone else stepping back. When the choir falls in behind her, the room feels warmer. It got a lot bigger. She’s singing higher now, softer, she’s feeling it. She’s preaching to the choir, in the best sense of that phrase. The piano solo stays modest — a simple, jazzy line, pulled back on the beat — and after a pause, guitar, organ, and soprano sax all drift back in around her for the close. This would make any church service happy — which might be the whole point of the record.
Israel didn’t record this with one of his working bands — he called in people he calls family. Inspiration moves easily through jazz, blues, and gospel. For Israel, the pulpit and the bandstand were never separate callings. He just kept moving between them, his whole life.
