Cincinnati Pops Orchestra: Harlem Renaissance

New York's Harlem Renaissance, which spanned the 1920s and '30s, was an intellectual and cultural movement of music, dance, art, fashion, literature, theater, politics and scholarship that reshaped African-American culture and mores in Harlem and beyond and led to a new militancy and dedication to the cause of civil rights and equality for people of color in the U.S.

On Harlem Renaissance, the celebrated Cincinnati Pops Orchestra honors the movement by delving into its music and depicting the wide range of jazz styles it inspired. And what better way to start than with the music of Duke Ellington, arguably the foremost composer and bandleader of that era. Ellington's "The Mooche," which opens the performance, is followed by his aptly named "Harlem." The Pops is supported on the earlier tracks by pianist Marcus Roberts' trio (Marty Jaffe, bass; Jason Marsalis, drums) and the Roberts-led tentet Modern Jazz Generation.

Besides Ellington, the Pops reproduces compositions by Kurt Weill, James P. Johnson, Moises Simons, W.C. Handy, Carlos Simon and Cab Calloway, most of which are seldom if ever heard today, perchance for good reason. The exceptions are Handy's timeless "St. Louis Blues," Ellington's "Sophisticated Lady" and Simons' "El Manisero" (better known as  "The Peanut Vendor," nicely sung and scatted here by Tatiana LadyMay Mayfield). There are two more vocals, by Mykal Kilgore, on Weill and Langston Hughes' "Lonely House" (from the play Street Scene) and Calloway's once-chic but now-campy "Are You Hep to the Jive?"

With so many heavyweight composers and accomplished musicians in the lineup, a reasonable assumption would be that this is a vibrant and persuasive session, one whose highlights are many and shortcomings few. Alas, that is hardly the case. For some curious reason—perhaps owing to the choice of material and/or how it was arranged—the anthology is by and large mundane and seldom catches fire. The introductory numbers are especially lackluster; "The Mooche" is not among Ellingston's first-class works, "Harlem" is less than spellbinding, Weill's "Lonely House" is downright depressing, and Johnson's "Yamekraw," even though it has its fiery moments (as does "Harlem"), overstays its welcome, meandering on for more than 18 mostly forgettable minutes.

"The Peanut Vendor" marks a pleasant change of pace, and the Pops' string section is superb on a handsome reading of Ellington's "Sophisticated Lady," which leads to the album's clear-cut highlight, a fresh and powerful arrangement of Handy's "St. Louis Blues." While Simon's "Hellfighters' Blues" may seem on odd choice for inclusion, it is hardly out of place alongside, say, "Harlem" or "Yamekraw," and swings harder and more often than either of them. Still and all, it is more pop showpiece than jazz, which is true more often than not through the whole of Harlem Renaissance.

As the premise for such a tribute was sound, and its prospects broad and inclusive, what went wrong? The (uninformed) opinion here is that the Pops tried to do too many things at once, tossing as many disparate ingredients as possible into a blender and hoping the result would be tasteful and pleasing. Although there are moments when the recipe works well, there are too many others where it falls well short of tolerable. An earnest but largely misguided endeavor whose promise eclipsed its enactment.