Taj Mahal is an icon of music. His gravelly vocals have touched on many forms over his fifty plus years as a musician – Blues, jazz, reggae, Cuban, Samba, tango, many different African rhythms, anything that he can put his skills to. Incredibly, he is neither a copyist or a slave to the music: he bends it to his own, wonderful, persona and makes music for the ages.
With ‘Savoy’ it seems that he has finally turned to the kind of dance music that his parents would have met and danced to in places such as Harlem’s Savoy Ballroom. Big band numbers, swing, straight jazz and even Western swing. A collection of classics, many of them songs that have been covered more than a hundred times and to which you would think he simply couldn’t put his own mark on – except that he does and every track here makes you feel you are hearing it for the first time. How do you do a version of ‘Summertime’ and give it a new life? Taj manages it by making it a swing number and moving the feel of the song from the banks of the Mississippi to Harlem and the inner city. Similarly, ‘Is You Is Or Is You Ain’t My Baby’ where his vocals take the song by its roots and make it impassioned rather than just stylish. ‘Do Nothing ‘til You Hear From Me’ is followed by ‘Sweet Georgia Brown’ and you instantly forget any other version you ever heard. He is joined by Maria Muldaur on ‘Baby Its’ Cold Outside’ and by Evan Price on violin.
Every track conjures images of Louis Armstrong or Cab Calloway or Ray Charles (or even Dan Hicks at times) and their outfits, but still make you hear Taj Mahal and makes you also listen to the songs afresh.
Savoy was recorded at 25th Street Recording in Oakland with engineer Gabriel Shepard. Taj showed up the first day about 1:00 PM and settled in with cups of sweet tea. Backing Taj Mahal vocals and harmonica on Savoy is a rhythm section comprised of Danny Caron - guitar; Ruth Davies - bass; John Simon - piano; and Leon Joyce, Jr. - drums; with background vocals by Carla Holbrook, Leesa Humphrey and Charlotte McKinnon.
On the first day of recording, the band was running down John Simon’s arrangement of ‘Stompin’ at the Savoy’ with encouragement from Taj. Chick Webb had the first hit with the song in 1934 and Ella later recorded it with Louis Armstrong. Taj said, “It needs a little more sashay. You’ll know it when you hear it.” Co-Executive Producer Holger Petersen who was at the session shares, “and everybody did! ”
I admit to being a huge fan of Taj Mahal but this album came over as a complete surprise, a real delight and one that will be spending a lot of time on my decks this spring.
