Chicago’s “Record Row,” which once featured such legendary labels as Chess, Brunswick and Vee-Jay, looks a lot different than it did during the city’s R&B heyday in the 1960s. The recording studios are gone, replaced by vacant lots and businesses. Chess remains, but as a museum dedicated to that bygone era.
But the sound of soul is alive and well in Chicago.
The first Chi-Soul Fest, hosted by Navy Pier Wednesday to Saturday, pays homage in part to the sound of rhythm and blues on Record Row. Artists such as Syleena Johnson, daughter of blues singer Syl Johnson, will perform, as well as newer acts such as Sam Trump and Isaiah Sharkey.
Johnson, an R&B artist, released “Rebirth of Soul” in November, an album which covers soul music from the ’50s and ’60s. Her father produced the album.
Daniel Crane, a program coordinator with Navy Pier, began planning the Chi-Soul Fest in October, timing the event to occur during Black Music Appreciation Month. Their team partnered with Vocalo Radio to curate its lineup. They focused on local artists with national reputations, like Trump, a singer-songwriter who describes his sound as “sophisticated soul.”
Trump came to Chicago from Houston in 2009 to study music at Columbia College. “Chicago is a mecca for soul: jazz, blues, soul, hip hop,” he says. “The energy of the city breeds quality talent, because that’s the bar that was set decades ago (by soul artists).”
Yet it’s not always the old soul sound that inspires contemporary soul singers in Chicago.
Christian JaLon, a 20-year-old soul artist from the Auburn-Gresham neighborhood and a performer at Chi-Soul Fest, began singing soul and gospel music at the Lilydale First Baptist Church on the South Side when she was 5 years old. JaLon, a born-again Christian, said her sound is inspired by scripture, emotions and artists such as Lauryn Hill and Billie Holiday. At the festival, JaLon says, “I hope people feel something uplifting and encouraging when they listen (to my music); I hope it meets them in an honest place.”
Ayana Contreras, host of the radio show “Reclaimed Soul” and a self-proclaimed “Chicago soul historian,” will be hosting a live broadcast of her show from the festival. Contreras fell in love with the ’70s soul samples she heard in the beats of ’90s hip-hop tracks by artists like Wu-Tang Clan and LL Cool J.She discovered that a lot of the sampled songs were written and recorded in her Chicago hometown.
As for the younger acts, Contreras says, “I think it’s really great that the lineup isn’t just pulling people out of the mothballs … that there are younger people performing and connecting to the older soul music.”
Johnson says soulful music can still be found in many genres, and points to artists such as Chance the Rapper and Daniel Caesar as prime examples. “Soul isn’t a genre, it’s about what you’ve been through and connecting to your experience,” she says. You can be a soul singer in pop, alternative rock or other genres as long as you’re singing from the soul.”
msmith@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @thewordsmithm
What: Chi-Soul Fest
When: Wednesday-Saturday
Where: The stages at Navy Pier, 600 E Grand Ave, Chicago
Tickets: Free; navypier.org
![“Let the music do the talking,” sang Phish vocalist-guitarist Trey Anastasio at the outset of the band’s concert Saturday at the Sphere in Las Vegas. Normally, hearing that advice from a well-disciplined virtuoso who seemingly never tires of the stage and worships the groove would pass without a hint of potential irony. However, given the group was not even one minute into the third of its sold-out four-night stand at the $2.3 billion dome — expressly devised to push sensory boundaries to previously uncharted limits — one couldn’t help wonder how seriously Phish would take its own instruction. Turns out […]](https://www.chicagotribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/CTC-L-ENT-PHISH-04-e1713888536637.jpg?w=620 "“Let the music do the talking,” sang Phish vocalist-guitarist Trey Anastasio at the outset of the band’s concert Saturday at the Sphere in Las Vegas. Normally, hearing that advice from a well-disciplined virtuoso who seemingly never tires of the stage and worships the groove would pass without a hint of potential irony. However, given the group was not even one minute into the third of its sold-out four-night stand at the $2.3 billion dome — expressly devised to push sensory boundaries to previously uncharted limits — one couldn’t help wonder how seriously Phish would take its own instruction. Turns out […]")