BLACK MUSIC MONTH CLASSICS
Fertile Rewards: The Return of Fertile Ground
By Mark Anthony Neal
According to their publicity, the group Fertile Ground has sold more than 125,000 discs. In an era when bad rappers and American Idol rejects often sell twice as much, Fertile Ground’s records sales might not seem significant. But the group has sold all of those records without distribution from a major label or any support from radio or traditional video outlets. Of course stories of third-tier gangsta rappers who moved 100,000 units out of the back of their jeeps are hip-hop lore, but that’s what makes Fertile Ground’s achievement all that more astounding: against the grain of the hip-hop and R&B that masquerades as great black music, Fertile Ground has created a rich mix of Jazz, R&B, Soul that has resonated with those thirsting for Black music (with a capital "B") and artists that are more conscious of tradition than how many rotations can be garnered on a Clear Channel station. Fertile Ground’s latest recording Black Is…, the group’s fourth recording, is the fertile reward of seven years of struggle and passion to make great black music.
The Fertile Ground story begins with keyboardist James Collins. A graduate of the University of Maryland, where he majored in Biochemistry, Collins grew up a fan of jazz music and played trumpet while a student in the Baltimore Public School system. Collins was playing gigs with his jazz band and enrolled in medical school at Johns Hopkins University, when he was given a tip about a local vocalist who was a student at Baltimore’s HBCU Morgan State University. That vocalist was Navasha Daya. According to Collins, after Daya sat in with the band one night he dropped out of medical school and “started to embark upon our beautiful musical career.” With fellow band members including percussionist Ekendra Das, saxophonist Craig Alston, and trumpeter Freddie Dunn, Collins and Daya forged forward with Fertile Ground; Their first full-length recording Field Songs was released in 1998.
From the beginning Collins and the band had a deep sense that they would have to pursue a different course than what was happening in the mainstream recording industry. As Collins admitted in a recent interview, “over the last 15 or 20 years, the way records have been marketed has been by exclusively national, commercial entities” adding that “We don’t really go the commercial route of putting out a record and you work with the top producers, who do the same thing that’s already out there…we try to focus, more or less, on the legacy of art.” And that focus on the “legacy of art” is perhaps what most distinguishes Fertile Ground from so many of their contemporary peers. Listening to their new recording Black Is…, as well as their previous outings, you can hear strong strains of Nina Simone, Pharaoh Sanders, Gil Scott-Heron, Fela Kuti, Duke Ellington and even a lesser know genius like Doug Carn, who in the 1970s made classic recordings like Infant Eyes and Adam’s Apple for the independent Black Jazz Label. Like Carn, Fertile Ground mixes good music with uplifting lyrics and an independent spirit about the music industry. But Collins is quick to add that Fertile Ground’s musical influences go beyond the obvious choices noting that “you’ll also hear Talib Kweli and Esthero and even a little hint of Bjork.”
There are many highlights on Black Is…, including “Live in the Light”, “Changing Woman”, “A Blues for Me”, and “Yellow Daisies” (Collins’s favorite), but it is the title track “Black Is…” that is likely to most stir emotions. Collins recounted the band’s performance of “Black Is…” at recent show at Blues Alley in Washington, DC., where a white family walked out because they were “uncomfortable” with the song. According to Collins, “I think that pretty much sums up the reason we put the record out” adding “The chorus to the track is ‘Black is Beautiful’, that was my conclusion, but I feel that regardless of what the conclusion is, the question is still the same—“What is Black?” And I think its something that is very relevant right now.”
Collins sees the need to record a track like “Black Is…” as important, particularly at a historical moment when marketing firms and publicists hold so much sway in determining what “blackness” is. In Collins’s view, “we need to establish what makes us, a people, and hold on to those things, because if we don’t, then the dominating cultural forces, right now the marketing forces, will define us. That’s why we start to become defensive—‘we’re more than hip-hop, slang and baggy jeans’—the only reason that becomes a conversation is because other images of blackness are not being equally marketed, equally professed.
The passion and love of black music and culture that Collins and band members profess comes through powerfully in all of the group’s music. But of course there might be detractors who question why Collins, for example, would choose to give up on a career in the medical profession, in order to become a struggling musician. Collins’s choice ultimately was predicated on the fact that he believes that Fertile Ground is part of something larger—a belief that it is vitally important at this moment to replenish the well of black expressive culture. That so many black folk see such efforts as a waste of time and energy has deep implications for black youth who might not see the importance of maintaining black creative traditions, be it in music, visual arts, literature or dance. Collins notes that it’s “unfortunate that in industries that we dominate, we don’t raise our kids to be musicians, not even to learn music business or the business of music, so that we can stop complaining about the fact the we got to deal with these culturally insensitive people to put our records and our art out.” “Ultimately” Collins observes, “this is the same fight that Spike Lee has to have, that Haile Gerima has to have, that Quincy Jones had to have.”
*Originally Published in 2004
By Mark Anthony Neal
According to their publicity, the group Fertile Ground has sold more than 125,000 discs. In an era when bad rappers and American Idol rejects often sell twice as much, Fertile Ground’s records sales might not seem significant. But the group has sold all of those records without distribution from a major label or any support from radio or traditional video outlets. Of course stories of third-tier gangsta rappers who moved 100,000 units out of the back of their jeeps are hip-hop lore, but that’s what makes Fertile Ground’s achievement all that more astounding: against the grain of the hip-hop and R&B that masquerades as great black music, Fertile Ground has created a rich mix of Jazz, R&B, Soul that has resonated with those thirsting for Black music (with a capital "B") and artists that are more conscious of tradition than how many rotations can be garnered on a Clear Channel station. Fertile Ground’s latest recording Black Is…, the group’s fourth recording, is the fertile reward of seven years of struggle and passion to make great black music.
The Fertile Ground story begins with keyboardist James Collins. A graduate of the University of Maryland, where he majored in Biochemistry, Collins grew up a fan of jazz music and played trumpet while a student in the Baltimore Public School system. Collins was playing gigs with his jazz band and enrolled in medical school at Johns Hopkins University, when he was given a tip about a local vocalist who was a student at Baltimore’s HBCU Morgan State University. That vocalist was Navasha Daya. According to Collins, after Daya sat in with the band one night he dropped out of medical school and “started to embark upon our beautiful musical career.” With fellow band members including percussionist Ekendra Das, saxophonist Craig Alston, and trumpeter Freddie Dunn, Collins and Daya forged forward with Fertile Ground; Their first full-length recording Field Songs was released in 1998.
From the beginning Collins and the band had a deep sense that they would have to pursue a different course than what was happening in the mainstream recording industry. As Collins admitted in a recent interview, “over the last 15 or 20 years, the way records have been marketed has been by exclusively national, commercial entities” adding that “We don’t really go the commercial route of putting out a record and you work with the top producers, who do the same thing that’s already out there…we try to focus, more or less, on the legacy of art.” And that focus on the “legacy of art” is perhaps what most distinguishes Fertile Ground from so many of their contemporary peers. Listening to their new recording Black Is…, as well as their previous outings, you can hear strong strains of Nina Simone, Pharaoh Sanders, Gil Scott-Heron, Fela Kuti, Duke Ellington and even a lesser know genius like Doug Carn, who in the 1970s made classic recordings like Infant Eyes and Adam’s Apple for the independent Black Jazz Label. Like Carn, Fertile Ground mixes good music with uplifting lyrics and an independent spirit about the music industry. But Collins is quick to add that Fertile Ground’s musical influences go beyond the obvious choices noting that “you’ll also hear Talib Kweli and Esthero and even a little hint of Bjork.”
There are many highlights on Black Is…, including “Live in the Light”, “Changing Woman”, “A Blues for Me”, and “Yellow Daisies” (Collins’s favorite), but it is the title track “Black Is…” that is likely to most stir emotions. Collins recounted the band’s performance of “Black Is…” at recent show at Blues Alley in Washington, DC., where a white family walked out because they were “uncomfortable” with the song. According to Collins, “I think that pretty much sums up the reason we put the record out” adding “The chorus to the track is ‘Black is Beautiful’, that was my conclusion, but I feel that regardless of what the conclusion is, the question is still the same—“What is Black?” And I think its something that is very relevant right now.”
Collins sees the need to record a track like “Black Is…” as important, particularly at a historical moment when marketing firms and publicists hold so much sway in determining what “blackness” is. In Collins’s view, “we need to establish what makes us, a people, and hold on to those things, because if we don’t, then the dominating cultural forces, right now the marketing forces, will define us. That’s why we start to become defensive—‘we’re more than hip-hop, slang and baggy jeans’—the only reason that becomes a conversation is because other images of blackness are not being equally marketed, equally professed.
The passion and love of black music and culture that Collins and band members profess comes through powerfully in all of the group’s music. But of course there might be detractors who question why Collins, for example, would choose to give up on a career in the medical profession, in order to become a struggling musician. Collins’s choice ultimately was predicated on the fact that he believes that Fertile Ground is part of something larger—a belief that it is vitally important at this moment to replenish the well of black expressive culture. That so many black folk see such efforts as a waste of time and energy has deep implications for black youth who might not see the importance of maintaining black creative traditions, be it in music, visual arts, literature or dance. Collins notes that it’s “unfortunate that in industries that we dominate, we don’t raise our kids to be musicians, not even to learn music business or the business of music, so that we can stop complaining about the fact the we got to deal with these culturally insensitive people to put our records and our art out.” “Ultimately” Collins observes, “this is the same fight that Spike Lee has to have, that Haile Gerima has to have, that Quincy Jones had to have.”
*Originally Published in 2004
No comments:
Post a Comment