| The Omnichord Real Book | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | June 2, 2023 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 72:25 | |||
| Language | English, Xhosa | |||
| Label | Blue Note | |||
| Meshell Ndegeocello chronology | ||||
| ||||
The Omnichord Real Book is a 2023 studio album by American musician Meshell Ndegeocello. It was met with acclaim from critics and became the first recipient of the newly created Grammy Award for Best Alternative Jazz Album, at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards. [3] [4]
| Aggregate scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| Metacritic | 81/100 [3] |
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [5] |
| The Arts Desk |  [6] |
| Exclaim! | 8/10 [7] |
| Pitchfork | 7.8/10 [8] |
| PopMatters | 8/10 [9] |
According to the review aggregator Metacritic , The Omnichord Real Book received "universal acclaim" based on a weighted average score of 81 out of 100 from eight critic scores. [3] Editors at AllMusic rated this album 4.5 out of 5 stars, with critic Andy Kellman writing that the album has "a plenitude of supple rhythmic and ruminative vocal interplay". [5] Peter Quinn of The Arts Desk gives it 4 out of 5 stars, spotlighting several key tracks and calling this release "a treasure trove of musical memories". [6] At Exclaim! , Antoine-Samuel Mauffette Alavo gave this album an 8 out of 10, stating that Ndegeocello allows her collaborators to shine and that this release is "a very solid start to [her] tenure at Blue Note". [7] In Glide Magazine, Jim Hynes writes that "there's so much to digest here that we may hear it a bit differently each time it plays". [1] Louder Than War 's Gordon Rutherford scores The Omnichord Real Book 4.5 out of 5 for "a host of outstanding collaborators" and music that is "indubitably special" and "defies classification" that displays Ndegeocello's "absolute virtuosity". [10] Writing for NPR, Nate Chinen calls this an "expansive yet interior new album" that explores "realness". [2] That outlet also highlighted this album as one of the five best releases of the week for All Songs Considered . [11] Writing for Pitchfork, Matthew Ismael Ruiz rated this album a 7.8 out of 10, calling it "a natural synthesis of the jazz, rock, dub, and soul" that is consistent with Ndegeocello's sound. [8] An 8 out of 10 came from Matthew Ruiz of PopMatters who called this music "stellar soul", which he compares to several styles but calls singularly Ndegeocello's own. [9]
Editors at NPR Music chose this among the 50 best albums of 2023 and further distinguished it for praise with a crown signifying that it was recommended "to anyone looking for a spark, or a slow burn". [12] Carl Wilson at NPR Music chose this to be among the 50 best albums of 2023. [12] This album was included in a list of 24 runners-up for the best albums of 2023 in Slate . [13] Editors at AllMusic included this on their list of the best albums of 2023 [14] and among their favorite R&B albums of 2023. [15] Editors at online retailer Qobuz included this on their list of the best jazz albums of 2023. [16]
At the 66th Annual Grammy Awards in 2024, The Omnichord Real Book won the inaugural Grammy Award for Best Alternative Jazz Album. [4] It marked Ndegeocello's first Grammy for a solo work, and her second overall, following the 2021 Grammy Award for Best R&B Song that Robert Glasper, H.E.R., and she shared for "Better than I Imagined". [4]
Meshell Ndegeocello is an American singer-songwriter, poet, and bassist. She has gone by the name Meshell Suhaila Bashir-Shakur which is used as a writing credit on some of her mid-career work. Her music incorporates a wide variety of influences, including funk, soul, jazz, hip hop, reggae and rock. She has received significant critical acclaim throughout her career, being nominated for eleven Grammy Awards, and winning two. She also has been credited for helping to "spark the neo-soul movement".
Kish Kash is the third studio album by English electronic music duo Basement Jaxx, released on 20 October 2003 by XL Recordings and Astralwerks. After a lengthy tour which caused them exhaustion and homesickness, they settled in their new studio and wanted to develop a fresh new approach, less reliant on grooves and samples and more focused on songwriting.
Joseph Lee Henry is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer. He has released 15 studio albums and produced multiple recordings for other artists, including three Grammy Award-winning albums.
The Omnichord is an electronic musical instrument introduced in 1981 by the Suzuki Musical Instrument Corporation. It allows users to play distinctive harp-like arpeggios produced through an electronic strum plate, simulating the experience of playing a stringed instrument. Originally conceived as an electronic Autoharp, the Omnichord found popularity due to its portability, its unique timbre, and its value as a kitsch object.
David Fiuczynski is an American contemporary jazz guitarist, best known as the leader of the Screaming Headless Torsos and David Fiuczynski's KiF, and as a member of Hasidic New Wave. He has played on more than 95 albums as a session musician, band leader, or band member.
Tales is an album by the American musician Marcus Miller, released in 1995. He supported it with a North American tour.
Peace Beyond Passion is the second studio album by American musician Me'shell Ndegeocello, released on June 25, 1996, on Maverick Records. The album peaked at No. 63 on the Billboard 200 albums chart and No. 15 on the Top R&B Albums chart in 1996. It went on to become Ndegeocello's most commercially successful album. Widely acclaimed at the time of its release, the album received numerous awards and accolades including a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best R&B Album at the 39th Grammy Awards in 1997.
Bitter is the third album by Meshell Ndegeocello. It was released on August 24, 1999, on Maverick Records. The album peaked at #105 on the Billboard Top 200 in 1999. The album also peaked at number 13 on Billboard's Top Internet Albums chart and number 40 on Billboard's R&B Albums chart.
Cookie: The Anthropological Mixtape is the fourth studio album by American soul singer and rapper Meshell Ndegeocello, released on June 4, 2002 by Maverick Records. Following the commercial underperformance of her third studio album, Bitter (1999), her label encouraged her to return to her earlier sound and record an album that sounded more "black". Ndegeocello collaborated with a number of prominent Black musicians, including Talib Kweli, Missy Elliott, and Tweet, as well as her backing band, the Conscientious Objectors, and recorded the album during the summer of 2001. The record, which Ndegeocello modeled on the mixtapes of her childhood, adopted a hip-hop and R&B-influenced sound and political lyrics similar to that of her debut album, Plantation Lullabies (1993), focusing on themes such as consumerism, revolution, religion, and same-sex attraction. Throughout the album, Ndegeocello also features samples of recorded speeches by Black activists, poets, and musicians, such as Angela Davis, Gil Scott-Heron, Countee Cullen, and Etheridge Knight.
The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams is the seventh studio album by the American musician Meshell Ndegeocello. The album was released in August 2007. Five of the tracks were previously released on Meshell's 2006 EP, The Article 3.
Mikhail Tarasov, better known by his stage name Svoy, is an American producer/writer/artist for Universal Music Group in the genre of pop/electronica. He has seven self-produced albums and other records released via Mack Avenue Records/Sony Music Entertainment formerly known as Rendezvous Entertainment belonging to multi Grammy-nominated RIAA Gold-certified musician/media mogul Dave Koz and legendary radio chief executive/record producer Frank Cody, P-Vine Records/Blues Interactions, and Thistime Records. In 2024, he released a duo album in collaboration with Grammy-winning artist Kenny Garrett, entitled Who Killed AI?, on Mack Avenue Records.
Devil's Halo is the eighth studio album by American singer-songwriter and bassist Me'Shell Ndegéocello. It was released by Downtown Records on October 6, 2009.
Brandee Younger is an American harpist. Younger infuses classical, jazz, soul, and funk influences to the harp tradition pioneered by her predecessors and idols Dorothy Ashby and Alice Coltrane. Younger leads her own ensemble, performs as a soloist and has worked as a sideman for such musicians as Pharoah Sanders, Jack DeJohnette, Charlie Haden, Bill Lee and Reggie Workman, and other popular artists including Lauryn Hill, John Legend, Common, Ryan Leslie, Drake, Maxwell, The Roots, Moses Sumney and Salaam Remi. Younger is noted for her work with saxophonist Ravi Coltrane, who was featured on her 2019 release, Soul Awakening. She recorded and toured with drummer and producer Makaya McCraven following the release of his 2018 album Universal Beings.
Weather is the ninth studio album by American singer Meshell Ndegeocello, released on November 15, 2011, on the Naïve label.
Ventriloquism is the 12th studio album from Meshell Ndegeocello, released on March 16, 2018. The album covers eleven R&B and pop tracks originally recorded in the 1980s and 1990s. It was nominated for Best Urban Contemporary Album at the 2019 Grammy Awards.
Ranky Tanky is an American musical ensemble based in Charleston, South Carolina. It specializes in jazz-influenced arrangements of traditional Gullah music, a culture that originated among descendants of enslaved Africans in the Lowcountry region of the US Southeast. Apart from lead vocalist Quiana Parler, four of the group's members, Quentin Baxter, Kevin Hamilton, Clay Ross, and Charlton Singleton, previously played together in the Charleston jazz quartet The Gradual Lean in the late 1990s.
Arooj Aftab is a Pakistani-American singer, composer, and producer. A Grammy Award-winning artist, she has worked in various musical styles and idioms, including jazz and minimalism.
{{Infobox album | name = Jose | type = studio | artist = J Balvin | cover = Jose J Balvin.jpg | border = yes | alt = | caption = Cover for deluxe version of the album uses the same photograph but against a red background. | released = September 10, 2021 | label = Universal Latin | genre = Reggaeton | length = 79:20
This is a timeline documenting events of jazz in the year 2023.
This is a timeline documenting events of jazz in the year 2024.
