Original image by There Stands the Glass.
The multimedia presentation staged at Yardley Hall on Saturday, February 12, shouldn’t have worked. The languid drawl of a disembodied octogenarian narrator offered insights into a blend of grainy footage and live performances throughout the 90-minute show attended by several hundred people.
Yet the narrator was the gallant folklorist William Ferris and the six featured musicians possessed correspondingly auspicious talent. What might have resembled a tedious TED Talk was instead a vital exposition of Mississippi culture.
The concept is inspired by Voices of Mississippi: Artists and Musicians Documented by William Ferris. The Grammy Award-winning collection ranges from tracks by the blues icon Mississippi Fred McDowell to the beat poet Alan Ginsburg. Saturday’s concert was similarly expansive.
Shardé Thomas and Chris Mallory of the Rising Stars Fife & Drum Band, Luther and Cody Dickinson of the North Mississippi Allstars, the roots music mainstay Ruthie Foster and sought-after guitarist Marcus Machado didn’t play it straight.
Ferris’ footage of B.B. King was followed by the rarest of musical unicorns: a fresh version of “The Thrill Is Gone.” Thomas’ vocals on the shopworn warhorse as well as the life-affirming fife playing she demonstrated on other selections were the concert’s biggest revelations.
Her collaborators were almost as good. Ruthie Foster delivered a stunning a cappella reading of Son House’s “Grinnin’ In Your Face.” The low-key guitar duels between Dickinson and Machado were tasteful. The Kansas City vocalist Danielle Nicole made a fun guest appearance on “You Gotta Move.”
The frequent video segments could have been buzzkills had they not been so engaging. Rather than resembling fusty outtakes from Martin Scorsese’s 2003 documentary on the blues, they added vitality.
Logic dictates that a performance by the same lineup at a roadhouse like Kansas City’s Knuckleheads would have been preferable. Yet almost everything about Voices of Mississippi defies blues convention. The triumphant concert was a most pleasant surprise.