From The Other Side Jazz Band

CD version. From The Other Side is the only album Discogs lists for the From The Other Side Jazz Band, a thirteen-piece group of horns, strings, rhythm section and two vocalists, released by Soul Note in 1989. It is one of the least documented records in the label's catalogue of that period, and it is built as an ensemble record rather than a vehicle for one soloist. The liner notes are by Nat Hentoff, and the passage CAM Jazz reproduces from them describes songs that range from ballads to gospel, played with a shared conviction that music can bring different ways of life together.

The thirteen musicians form a small big band with voices. Pianist Michael Greenblatt is credited as composer of the music. Saxophonists Paula Gabriel (alto), Simon Sternberg (tenor and soprano) and Daniel Hoffman (baritone) sit alongside two trumpets and a trombone, and a rhythm section of guitar, bass and drums supports violinist Vanessa Gordon and the two singers, Tzipora Batyehuda and Shevachia Bat-Israel, and others. The seven pieces run from about five to twelve minutes. Sometime Soon, Universal Salvation Blues and the twelve-minute Devotion make up the first half, and Owed To A Jazz Man, Run To The Rock, Business As Usual and Saturday's Child follow. The titles point to the blues and to the language of gospel and devotion.

This is the Soul Note CD 121106-2, which Discogs lists as a reissue of the album first released in 1989, with the seven pieces as on the original running order.