Liz McComb - The Spirit of New Orleans

Music of all sorts can break shy people out of their shell.  Take for instance Liz McComb who as a shy young lady had no doubts about her singing ability.  As she developed her craft, she mixed her faith with a love for African-American musical history in expressing that faith.  Unlike many of her counterparts, McComb enjoys a profitable career in Europe.  The current France resident always yearned to record a project in one of music’s major meccas, New Orleans, birthplace to gospel groundbreakers Mahalia Jackson& Sister Rosetta Tharpe.  Originally available as an import and released in the U.S. this year, The Spirit of New Orleans was recorded four years before the infamous Katrina storm altered the tone of the festive city. 

Since the early eighties, McComb has called Paris, France home since touring as a headliner at various European festivals like the International Festival of Montreaux (Switzerland) and at Paris’ Olympia Theater.  Her extensive résumé includes opening for some of urban music’s greatest from James Brown to The Blind Boys of Alabama.  European audiences have responded with sheer enthusiasm and appreciation to McComb’s jazz/ blues drenched gospel performances that incorporate her church roots.  Her family played a major role in those musical endeavors.  Her mother, who is the pastor of a Cleveland, Ohio Pentecostal church, instilled that God will always make a way to follow her dream as a musician/songwriter.  After watching her sister take piano lessons, McComb followed suit, while her brother introduced her to jazz greats like Wes Montgomery and Max Roach.

Like many of her previous recordings, McComb aims for vocal and arranging liberties that most gospel contemporaries might avoid.    Even though she writes a bulk of her material, she mostly focuses to traditional pieces, especially spirituals, tying into the New Orleans culture.

For starters, the spiritual Over My Head begins with a slow acappella set-up leading into a joyful celebration of music’s magnetism:  “When I think of Jesus, I hear music in the air.”  

A southern gospel favorite, Just A Little Closer Walk With Thee, finds McComb stretching every last note with the utmost soulful detail. 

Other gospel classics, Happy Working For The Lord and I Know It Was The Blood are rendered persuasively whether calm or explosive without an over modulating mass choir.   

McComb’s rich gospel style delivery and dissonant piano attack on Ain’t No Grave lends a fresh perspective to this spiritual.

The original compositions also mesh well with the New Orleans theme.  We Are More, based on the scripture Romans 8:37, is a frantic, Afro-Cuban percussive excursion that claims we shall never be separated from the love of God.

The scriptural teachings of Broken Heart delivered with still another earnest performance by McComb, comforts those who about being broken before the Lord: “Blessed are they that mourn, Jesus said they would be comforted.” (Matthew 5:4)

One of Sister Tharpe’s biggest hits, Strange Things Are Happening Everyday, features a shivering guitar fills from Jam’ba, reminiscent of the blues rock guitar that Tharpe was best known for.

Knowing McComb can dare to be different, she reworks the climatic spiritual number, Old Man River from the musical production Showboat, into a sophisticated jazz big band arrangement anchored by the late Willy Tee on the piano.

McComb approached some of the finest musicians New Orleans has to offer, including the backing choir Eric Brown& Charity who provided the perfect counterpart on “Over My Head.” A four piece brass section that includes trumpeter Brian Murray also accompanies on the first four tracks, while shining collectively and as soloists. The rhythm section anchored by drummers Bernard Johnson and Herlin Riley plus Byron Johnson’s additional keyboards manages everything from dirges to the frantic Afro-Cuban percussion tinged “We Are More.”

The Spirit of New Orleans truly embodies the fervent and sincere spirit of the city, thanks to both the musicians and McComb’s uninhibited approach in everything she sings.   Whether humor, ecstasy, sorrow, or joy, McComb is never shy about how to express herself while always remembering who she is with God’s help.