1975 facsimile reissue of Mary Lou Williams’s magnum opus of religious jazz: Mary Lou’s Mass. Newsweek called the score “an encyclopedia of black music, richly represented from spirituals to bop to rock.” This is Williams’s “Music for Peace,” a landmark recording which addressed many of the social ills of the 1960s and 70s. It is perhaps the most openly religious jazz recording made at that time. In her own words, it is “Music for the Soul.”

Mary Lou Williams (born Mary Elfrieda Scruggs; May 8, 1910 – May 28, 1981) was an American jazz pianist, arranger, and composer. She wrote hundreds of compositions and arrangements and recorded more than one hundred records (in 78, 45, and LP versions).[2] Williams wrote and arranged for Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman, and she was friend, mentor, and teacher to Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Tadd Dameron, Bud Powell, and Dizzy Gillespie.

OK so I may be self-described as an atheist but it’s music like this that cannot fail to touch even the most cynical of souls.

Found in Honest Jon’s in King’s Cross - have to admit it was that cover that drew me in, not knowing anything about her.