Irvin Mayfield & the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra - Strange Fruit

 Irvin Mayfield and his fabulous New Orleans Jazz Orchestra perform on this album for the first time with the Dillard University Choir.  Irvin Mayfield has taken the classic Billie Holiday "Strange Fruit" and expanded it into an extravagantly orchestrated piece, often as heart-stopping as the original, for jazz orchestra, choir and narrator.

Theses musicians play with an electricity that should satisfy anyone who admires a big band sound, and Mayfield is his usual knockout self on trumpet. An unusual addition, the Dillard University Choir is chillingly effective, as is the terrific narration by actor Wendell Pierce (whom people may know from HBO's "The Wire").

This is a huge, exciting disc with some of the best contemporary jazz one could ask for, played by some of the world's great musicians. The sound quality is as exemplary as the performances.

According to Basin Street Records:At only 30 years old, Irvin Mayfield has quickly established himself as one of the most decorated and recorded Jazz musicians of his generation. Mayfield is a versatile trumpeter, bandleader, composer and arranger, recording artist, a passionate spokesman for the rich history and cultural significance of Jazz and the city that birthed it. Appointed the Cultural Ambassador of the City of New Orleans in 2003 by the United States Senate, Congress and other governmental agencies, his name has become synonymous with the still-unfolding legacy of America's only indigenous music