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Sacred Ground is a showcase for Sweet Honey in the Rock's Bernice
Johnson Reagon, Ysaye Maria Barnwell, Aisha Kahlil, Nitanju Bolade Casel
and Carol Maillard (assisted by sign language interpreter Shirley Childress
Johnson and poet Sonia Sanchez) to touch gently on their resonant core experiences
of reverence and passion, all amidst a gorgeous out-pouring of raw musical
beauty. While these singers may not have the five strongest individual voices
of the twenty-one women who have performed with Sweet Honey since 1973,
their collective voice is easily the richest and most confident in the group's
history.
Sacred Ground is a genre-defying melange that highlights each woman's
vocal strengths and songwriting talents: Johnson Reagon creates a modern
casting of traditional gospel structures on the powerful song-sermon "Sing
Oh Barren One"; Kahlil builds the towering "Mystic Oceans"
from small blocks of chant and ululation; Bolade Casel sweetly sings the
crystal lead over the soft doo-wop of "Inner Voices"; Maillard
blends an Indian Vedic sensibility with classic romantic group-harmony on
"Prayer to the One". Barnwell is the most gifted writer of the
five -- a true original hopefully bound to receive her due as one of America's
finest composers. Her three crushingly beautiful pieces on Sacred Ground
are baroque-transcendent, weaving simple musical figures then mutating them
through poly-chordal vocal progressions that will leave you holding your
breath for the palpable release felt when the tonic note returns.
Sacred Ground is a life-enhancing album that you need in your collection
to restore you, should you ever doubt the ability of fine art to illuminate,
uplift, and heal. Bolade Casel fittingly sings "listen to these words,
I know they are true" -- and one can never ever hear too much truth
from the gifted and wise Sweet Honey in the Rock.
Copyright 1995-1999: J. Eric Smith.
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