Esperanza Spalding – SONGWRIGHTS APOTHECARY LAB (2021) [FLAC 24bit/48kHz]

Esperanza Spalding has announced her new album SONGWRIGHTS APOTHECARY LAB, to be released September 24 on Concord Records. SONGWRIGHTS APOTHECARY LAB features 12 pieces of music, created and recorded over the past several months in her traveling laboratory, in collaboration with a host of musicians, researchers and practitioners. Each song was designed to have an intended effect for the listener, from grounding yourself in a moment of chaos and de-escalating interpersonal aggression to addressing the feelings of grief and loneliness brought on by the pandemic.

The Songwrights Apothecary Lab is a curated portal of new work that is growing out of spalding’s collaborative practice over the past years, exploring how songwriters might meaningfully incorporate therapeutic practices and knowledge into their process and production. The researchers and practitioners that partook in the labs specialize in fields ranging from neuroscience and music therapy to psychology and ethnomusicology.

Having garnered acclaim for her sophisticated and artful blend of jazz and R&B, bassist/vocalist Esperanza Spalding has continued to expand her sound, growing increasingly experimental and organic with each album. It’s an approach she takes to yet another boldly creative level with 2021’s Songwrights Apothecary Lab. The record shares its title with a class Spalding curates at Harvard that’s advertised as “half songwriting workshop, and half guided-research practice,” all of which sounds like it is intended to make both the writing and listening of music a more healing and uplifting experience. If that sounds somewhat esoteric and pseudo-spiritual, it is. Songwrights Apothecary Lab is a gorgeously rendered production that skirts the lines between art rock, free jazz, and wordless modern creative improvisation. Rather than using distinct song titles, Spalding designates each track as a numbered “Formwela,” a term that implies something between a song, a healing mantra, and a magical incantation. Some, like “Formwela 2” with vocalist Ganavya Doraiswamy, are wordless tone poems rich with vibrant harmonic colors. Others, like “Formwela 7,” are dark theatrical works featuring Spalding’s half-sung/half-spoken word lyrics against a crashing cacophony of horns, all of which evokes the work of the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Yet others, including three mid-album songs with vocalist/trombonist Corey King, are more lyrical, drawing upon folk and jazz influences and showcasing the duo’s warm vocal harmonies. While there are deeply engaging moments on Songwrights Apothecary Lab, not to mention songs of deft compositional precision, it’s an album far afield of the post-bop jazz, Latin, and R&B that initially earned Spalding attention. It’s an expansive, challenging album that often feels as if we are hearing each song leap out of Spalding in the moment, fully formed or not. Nonetheless, it’s clear that she is an immensely gifted and technically adept performer, something that remains at the forefront of Songwrights Apothecary Lab as she bounds with sprite-like joy through her kaleidoscopic formwelas.
– Matt Collar

Tracklist:
1. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 1
2. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 2
3. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 3
4. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 4
5. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 5
6. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 6
7. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 7
8. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 8
9. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 9
10. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 10
11. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 11
12. Esperanza Spalding – Formwela 13

Download:

mqs.link_EsperanzaSpaldingS0NGWRIGHTSAP0THECARYLAB20212448.rar

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