Morgan Freeman can add record producer to his long list of accolades throughout a career spanning six decades, as the iconic performer teams up with a host of acclaimed blues musicians to deliver a 12-song album documenting 100 years of blues music.
Freeman is the producer and narrator of the project titled Morgan Freeman Symphonic Blues Experience. The album will be released on August 7 through Decca Records.
““Rooted in stories transmitted from West Africa to the American South, blues music has become a testament to the enduring human spirit, the voice of America’s past and present, and the pulse of a culture that has refused to forget,” Freeman said in a statement.
The actor used a mix of legendary and contemporary blues musicians for the project, including Taj Mahal, Keb Mo and Shemekia Copeland. The album begins with Blind Willie Johnson’s famous song “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground” and covers the entire history of the development of blues music from the Mississippi Delta region and beyond, with covers of songs such as “The Thrill Is Gone”, “Traveling Riverside Blues” and others.
The album concludes with an Oscar-nominated cover Sinners “I Lied to You,” a fitting moment given that the film and its music helped reintroduce the mystique of the blues to a wider, younger audience last year.
To celebrate Juneteenth, Freeman is previewing the album with a version of Mahal’s cover of Son House’s “Death Letter Blues.” Mahal provides vocals and slide guitar on the song, and is accompanied on the track by a cinematic string section.
“I first heard blues music on my grandmother’s porch in the Mississippi Delta, and it never left me,” Freeman said. “Son House was one of the greatest truth tellers in this tradition. Taj Mahal is one of the greatest truth tellers in this. Releasing this on Juneteenth is not just symbolic — it’s the truth of where this music comes from and who made it. I hope people listen and remember.”
Eric Mayer, producer at morgan freeman symphonic blues experience, “This music was born from the same date that Juneteenth celebrates,” he said in a statement.
“‘Death Letter Blues’ is one of the most raw and honest pieces in the American songbook, and to hear the Taj Mahal inhabited with an entire symphony behind it – recorded between the hallowed walls of the Royal Studios and Abbey Road – is something groundbreaking and unique,” Mayer said. “We are very proud to introduce our album with this song.”
Born in Memphis and raised in the Mississippi Delta region, Freeman is a longtime blues fan and co-owner of Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Mississippi. While this is Freeman’s biggest foray into music, it’s not the first time he’s appeared on an album. He was featured on BOB’s song “Bombs Away” in 2012, and served as the narrator on Metro Boomin and 21 Savage’s 2020 collaborative album. Second brutal mode. He worked with Metro again to narrate the producer’s 2022 album Heroes and villains.
