The gospel according to nikki giovanni:

javon jackson with special guest nikki giovanni

Saturday, September 23

TIME: 3:45-4:45pm

VENUE: hyde park union church. 5600 south woodlawn ave.

The Gospel According To Nikki Giovanni

The Gospel According to Nikki Giovanni connects with the ancestral stream while putting a jazzy new perspective on timeless hymns and spirituals.

Why would one of poetry’s most revered voices want to curate a jazz saxophonist’s album of gospel hymns and spirituals? “These songs are so important,” says Nikki Giovanni, one of Oprah Winfrey’s 25 “Living Legends” and a Maya Angelou Lifetime Achievement Award winner for 2017. “They comforted people through times of slavery, and during recent years we needed them to comfort us again. But a lot of the students today do not know about the history of these songs, and they should. So I’m out here putting water on the flowers, because they need a drink.”

Giovanni’s historic collaboration with saxophonist-composer and former Jazz Messenger Javon Jackson has yielded The Gospel According to Nikki Giovanni, released on his Solid Jackson label.

“The spirituals have been around so long,” says the renowned poet, activist and educator, who came to prominence in the 1960s and ’70s as a foundational member of the Black Arts movement following the publication of such early works as 1968’s book of poetry Black Feeling, Black Talk/Black Judgment and 1970’s Re:Creation.

“Some spirituals have been updated and stayed around and some have been lost over time,” Giovanni notes “So for me, it’s just helping to keep something going. And I do it because there’s a need.” Jackson brings his bold-toned, Trane-inspired tenor lines to bear on a series of hymns, spirituals, and gospel numbers hand-picked by Giovanni, who was also the first person to receive the Rosa L. Parks Women of Courage Award.

And the 78-year-old poet makes a rare vocal appearance on the tender ballad “Night Song,” singing a song identified with her close friend, the late civil rights activist and High Priestess of Soul, Nina Simone. “Nina was a friend of mine, and I knew that one of her favorite songs was ‘Night Song’,” she explains. “And even though I’m not a singer, I told Javon I wanted to sing it because I just wanted Nina to be remembered.” Jackson, who flew to Nikki’s home in Roanoke, Virginia, to record her vocal track on the existing instrumental tracks, says, “I sat beside her when she sang it and by the time she finished that chorus, I was deeply moved. I just love the fragile nature of the way she treated it. It was very emotional.”

Joined by pianist Jeremy Manasia, Jackson interprets gospel staples like “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” “Wade in the Water,” “Didn’t My Lord Deliver Daniel” and “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms” with authoritative tenor tones, deep walking bass lines and an organic sense of group swing.

“It’s the first time I worked in a collaborative manner,” Jackson says. “The project is personal for me. I come from a lineage of devout Christians, and that has afforded me the chance to connect with that ancestral stream.”

Nikki Giovanni

Poet Nikki Giovanni was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, on June 7, 1943, and grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio. She graduated with a degree in history from Fisk University. A world-renowned poet and one of the foremost authors of the Black Arts Movement, her notable books of poetry are Black Judgment (1968) and Those Who Ride the Night Winds (1983), which were influenced by her participation in the Black Arts Movement and Black Power movement in the 1960s.

Giovanni has published numerous collections of poetry—from her first self-published volume, Black Feeling Black Talk (1968), to New York Times bestseller Bicycles: Love Poems (2009). She has written several works of nonfiction and children’s literature and made multiple recordings, including the Emmy-award nominated The Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection (2004). Her most recent publications include Make Me Rain: Poems & Prose (2020); Chasing Utopia: A Hybrid (2013); and, as editor, The 100 Best African American Poems (2010). She has published more than two dozen volumes of poetry, essays, and edited anthologies and 11 illustrated children’s books, including Rosa, an award-winning biography of Rosa Parks.

Giovanni has received numerous awards, including the 2022 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the inaugural Rosa L. Parks Woman of Courage Award, the American Book Award, the Langston Hughes Award, the Virginia Governor’s Award for the Arts, the Emily Couric Leadership Award, a Literary Excellence Award. She is a seven-time recipient of the NAACP Image Award. Her autobiography, Gemini, was a finalist for the 1973 National Book Award. In 2004, her album, The Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection, was a Grammy finalist for Best Spoken Word Album.

Javon Jackson

Born on June 16, 1965, in Carthage, Missouri, Jackson was raised in Denver, Colorado, and chose saxophone at the age of 10. At age 16, he switched from alto to tenor and later enrolled at the University of Denver before spending part of 1985–86 at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. He left Berklee in 1986 to join Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers and remained a fixture in the group until Blakey’s passing in 1990. The following year, Jackson made his recording debut with Me and Mr. Jones, featuring James Williams, Christian McBride, and master drummer Elvin Jones. He joined Jones’ group in 1992, appearing on his albums Youngblood and Going Home. Jackson’s 1994 Blue Note debut, When the Time Is Right, was a straight-ahead affair produced by iconic jazz vocalist and bandleader Betty Carter. His subsequent four recordings for the Blue Note label through the ‘90s were produced by Craig Street and featured wildly eclectic programs ranging from Caetano Veloso, Frank Zappa, and Santana to Muddy Waters, Al Green, and Serge Gainsbourg. Jackson followed with four recordings for the Palmetto label that had him exploring a blend of funk, jazz, and soul with such stellar sidemen as organist Dr. Lonnie Smith, guitarists Mark Whitfield and David Gilmore, trombonist Fred Wesley, and drummer Lenny White.

The musicians:

Javon Jackson - Tenor Saxophone

Jeremy Manasia - Piano

Nikki Giovanni - Voice