Sacred jazz isjazz composed and performed with religious intent.^[1][2][3]

Jazz has always incorporated aspects of African American sacred music includingspirituals andhymns, which jazz musicians often performed renditions of as part of their repertoire. Many other jazz artists also borrowed from blackgospel music. BeforeWorld War II, American churches, black and white, regarded jazz and blues with suspicion or outright hostility as "the devil's music". It was only after World War II that a few jazz musicians began to compose and perform extended works intended for religious settings or expression.

Since the 1950s, sacred and liturgical music has been performed and recorded by many jazz composers and musicians,^[4][1] combining black gospel music and jazz to produce "sacred jazz", similar in religious intent, but differing in gospel's lack of extended instrumental passages, instrumental improvisation, hymn-like structure, and concern with social and political issues.Mahalia Jackson andRosetta Tharpe contributed to gospel and sacred jazz along with pianist and composerMary Lou Williams, known for her Jazz Masses in the 1950s, andDuke Ellington. Ellington included "Come Sunday" and "Twenty-third Psalm" inBlack, Brown and Beige, an album he recorded in 1958 with Jackson.

The societal changes of the 1960s included changes in attitudes toward the arts in both theCatholic andProtestant churches, which slowly became more open to the liturgical use of jazz.^[1] Mary Lou Williams continued composing sacred jazz, including her "Black Christ of the Andes" (1964) in honor of newly canonizedMartin De Porres, and Duke Ellington wrote three Sacred Concerts: 1965 – A Concert of Sacred Music; 1968 – Second Sacred Concert; 1973 – Third Sacred Concert. Other artists includingJohn Coltrane,Dave Brubeck,Lalo Schifrin andVince Guaraldi performed and recorded major sacred jazz works. Most works were in the Christian tradition, but some were inspired by Asian and African religious traditions, such as John Coltrane's "A Love Supreme,"Alice Coltrane's "Universal Consciousness", andPharoah Sanders' "Karma".

One of the most popular figures in the modern form of the genre is theAfrican-American saxophonistKirk Whalum, whose fusion of jazz andBlack Gospel music has garnered a litany ofGrammy Award nominations and produced a number of bestselling albums.^[5][6][7][8]

The most common form of sacred jazz is the JazzMass. Although most often performed in a concert setting rather than church worship setting, this form has many examples. Eminent examples of composers of the Jazz Mass includeMary Lou Williams andEddie Bonnemère. Having become disillusioned with her life as a secular performer, Williams converted to Catholicism in 1954.^[9] She proceeded to compose three Masses in the jazz idiom:^[10] - The Pittsburgh Mass, another which was composed in 1968 to honor the recently (April 1968)assassinated Martin Luther King Jr. and the third was commissioned by a pontifical commission. It was performed once in 1975 in St Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. Williams pursued composing and advocating for sacred jazz as a divine vocation.

In 1966 Joe Masters recorded "Jazz Mass" for Columbia Records. A jazz ensemble was joined by soloists and choir using the English text of the Roman Catholic Mass.^[11] Other examples include "Jazz Mass in Concert" byLalo Schiffrin (Aleph Records, 1998, UPC 0651702632725) and "Jazz Mass" byVince Guaraldi (Fantasy Records, 1965). In England, classical composerWill Todd recorded his "Jazz Missa Brevis" with jazz ensemble, soloists and the St Martin's Voices on a 2018 Signum Records release, "Passion Music/Jazz Missa Brevis" also released as "Mass in Blue," and jazz organist James Taylor composed "The Rochester Mass" (Cherry Red Records, 2015).^[12] In a dissertation in 2013, Angelo Versace put forth bassistIke Sturm and New York composerDeanna Witkowski as contemporary exemplars of sacred and liturgical jazz.^[1]

Although including the wordMass in its title, the "Abyssinian Mass" byWynton Marsalis—himself raised a Catholic—is not, strictly speaking, a setting of theCatholic Mass but fuses traditions ofNew Orleans andbig band jazz with worship in theBlack Church, including Scripture, prayer, sermon, processional and recessional.^[13] A recording of a performance lasting two hours, which featured theJazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Marsalis, Damien Sneed and Chorale Le Chateau, was released on Blue Engine Records in 2016. The expansive work was commissioned in honor of the 200th anniversary of theAbyssinian Baptist Church in New York City'sHarlem. The sermon section features the church's pastor, Rev.Calvin O. Butts III, whose message is inclusively interfaith. However, Christiandoctrine is retained in the jazz settings of theLord's Prayer,Gloria Patri andDoxology. The work, which has antecedents in Marsalis' previous work, was performed both at the church andLincoln Center in New York City and on a national tour.^[14]

PianistCyrus Chestnut grew up performing gospel and hearing jazz inBaltimore before obtain a master's degree fromBerklee College of Music. He has consistently recorded and performed sacred jazz throughout his successful career.^[15]

After 1990,Charles Gayle frequently composed, performed and recorded sacred jazz in thefree jazz idiom playing a number of instruments with various jazz musicians.^[16]

Versace offered detailed profiles of Witkowski and Sturm and brief profiles of many other contributors to the sacred jazz movement.^[1]

• Jazz genres
• African-American culture
• Religious music

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