Barb Jungr - Walking in the Sun - Jazzwise

A funky percussion intro is joined by a chunky double bass riff. Must be the latest Cassandra Wilson release, right? Wrong. On her fifth album for Linn Records Barb Jungr - flanked by the members of her new trio, pianist Jenny Carr and organist Jessica Lauren - returns to her first love, blues and gospel, and delivers her most compellingly sung and intensely vital collection to date. Compared to her acclaimed homages to Brel, Dylan and Presley, "Walking in the Sun" is promiscuously inclusive. Jungr's finely tuned sense of high-wire drama is brought to bear on the vivid imagery of Bo Diddley's Who Do You Love?, the wistful yearning of Carole King's Way Over Yonder, Jimmy Cliff's Many Rivers to Cross complete with an ecstatic, hair-raising conclusion and, naturally, a further brace of Dylan songs (the powerful narratives of Trouble in Mind and Blind Willie McTell). The overriding impression is of each song being filtered through a decidedly creative and imaginative mind.