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01.DAVY GRAHAM: “Better Git It In Your Soul,” 1964
British folk guitarist Davy Graham was a lifelong collector. Even at a young age, in the early sixties, he traveled the world in search of new, exotic sounds, studying folk music from Greece and North Africa, blues and jazz. In 1964, on his album “Blues, Folk & Beyond”, he covered songs by Bob Dylan, Leadbelly and Willie Dixon in his characteristic fingerpicking style, as well as “Better Git It In Your Soul”, a piece by the American jazz bassist and composer Charles Mingus.
02. DONOVAN: “Sunny Goodge Street,” 1965
Charles Mingus’ music also finds its way into the London underground. More specifically, in a street scene in front of the subway station on Goodge Street, which Donovan sings about on his 1965 album “Fairytale”: “Listenin’ to sounds of Mingus, mellow, fantastic,” it says. In this urban folk song you can hear the influence of Dylan and the beats – but also jazz, which is particularly noticeable through the contribution of the Jamaican flautist Harold McNair. McNair had actually played with Mingus in the rehearsal room four years earlier and can also be heard on records by Nick Drake, John Martyn, Ginger Baker and Jimi Hendrix.
03. PENTANGLE: “Pentangling,” 1968
When asked if Pentangle were a folk-rock band, guitarist John Renbourn grimaced as if in pain. If anything, then folk jazz! What exactly he means can already be heard on their debut, “The Pentangle” from 1968, especially in the programmatic “Pentangling”, in which the voices of Jacqui McShee and Bert Jansch swirl around each other as well as the guitars of Jansch and Renbourn. The stars of the recording, however, are drummer Terry Cox and bassist Danny Thompson, who not only form the springy foundation of this track, but also play their way into the foreground time and time again in a virtuoso but discreet manner.
04. VAN MORRISON: Astral Weeks, 1968
On “Astral Weeks” Van Morrison was accompanied by a whole jazz band. Bassist Richard Davis had previously played on records by saxophonist and clarinetist Eric Dolphy, guitarist Jay Berliner on Charles Mingus’ “The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady”, drummer Connie Kay belonged to the Modern Jazz Quartet, vibraphonist Warren Smith had already played for Miles Davis only the young flautist John Payne had no jazz merits, but had a Harvard degree. The interaction of these musicians on the title track of Morrison’s classic is so intoxicating that it takes you to higher spheres.
05. JOHN MARTYN: Road to Ruin, 1970
Jazz was always omnipresent with John Martyn. The flautist Harold McNair played on his second album from 1968, and on the second work with his wife Beverley, “The Road To Ruin”, he worked on a piece for the first time with Pentangle bassist Danny Thompson, who would become his in the following years should become the most important creative partner. But on the title track, South African saxophonist Dudu Pukwana is the co-star. By the way, the congas are played by the Ghanaian percussionist Rocky Dzidzornu, who can also be heard on “Sympathy For The Devil” by the Rolling Stones.
06. TIM BUCKLEY: “Monterey,” 1970
Tim Buckley’s folk roots, which were still evident on his 1966 debut, were no longer to be heard four years later. Already the recordings of his UK tour two years later (with Danny Thompson on bass) and his third album, “Happy Sad” (1969), showed that jazz was gradually becoming his main inspiration. On “Starsailor” (1970), Buckley finally lets his voice sound as wild and unbounded as Pharoah Sanders sounds his saxophone in his spiritual moments.
07. LAURA NYRO: Upstairs By A Chinese Lamp, 1970
The American songwriter Laura Nyro was never a folk singer – even though her first album was released on the Folkways label and she was often compared to Joni Mitchell. But the two artists meet more closely in their proximity to jazz than to folk. On one of her finest albums, “Christmas And The Beads Of Sweat” (1970), Nyro is joined by, among others, harpist (and saxophonist god widow) Alice Coltrane, bassist Richard Davis (see “Astral Weeks”) and flautist/saxophonist Accompanied by Joe Farrell, who played in pianist Chick Corea’s band and worked with Charles Mingus and Andrew Hill.
08. TERRY CALLIER: “Can’t Catch The Trane,” 1973
“The New Folk Sound Of Terry Callier” was the name of the singer and guitarist’s debut from Chicago, recorded in 1964 and released in 1968 on the jazz label Prestige. But you could already hear his soul and jazz ambitions in these interpretations of old traditionals. These finally became clear when he appeared as a songwriter on the next albums. On “I Just Can’t Help Myself” from 1973, he not only covers Duke Ellington’s “Satin Doll”, he also plays this wonderfully free homage to John Coltrane with a fabulous band.
09. JONI MITCHELL: Edith And The Kingpin, 1975
No one has brought folk and jazz together more beguilingly and convincingly than Joni Mitchell. Why people still don’t want to label their music as “folk-jazz” can also be seen in the Edith Piaf-inspired “Edith And The Kingpin” from Mitchell’s masterpiece “The Hissing Of Summer Lawns”. This isn’t about imitation or homage; you can’t see any seams or pieces here. This music is so unified and so unique that the only box it fits into is labeled “Joni Mitchell.”
10. MARK HOLLIS: “Watershed”, 1998
More than 20 years after Joni Mitchell, another musician tried his very own, idiosyncratic mix of folk and jazz (and modern classical): The Brit Mark Hollis had a few synth-pop hits with Talk Talk in the eighties, then drifted the band into esoteric realms, into modal jazz and improvisation. After her last work, “Laughing Stock” (1991), Hollis owed his record company Polydor one more album and ended up recording perhaps the quietest, most introspective work in pop history. An album of unplayed sounds, for which even a title would have been too much extra. That’s why the cover only says: “Mark Hollis”.