He may best known as the co-founder/leader of eclectic jazz/klezmer hybrids Klezmatics and Hasidic New Wave, but trumpeter/composer Frank London features in a half-dozen other acts, as well as authoring operas, concertos, symphonies, and song cycles. For Spirit Stronger Than Blood, he pairs with the Elders (pianist Marilyn Lerner, bassist Hilliard Greene, and drummer Newman Taylor Baker), plus HNW saxist Greg Wall, in order to pay tribute to his jazz influences. Thus fortified, London blends his usual swinging take on Jewish folk melodies with impressions from adventure jazz figures like Charles Mingus, Alice Coltrane, Lester Bowie, and Pharaoh Sanders on a program of originals that don’t sacrifice melody for technique. “Let There Be Peace,” “Abundant Love,” and the title number both front expansive melodies with bountiful energy, while “Resistance/Healing” deftly and enthusiastically swings and “Poem For a Blue Voice” stretches its ballad form into soulful luxury. This is simply beautiful stuff – expertly performed, lovingly composed, and with more heart than a surgical hospital.
