Morgan Freeman to Produce and Narrate Blues Album ‘Symphonic Blues Experience’
Morgan Freeman is adding record producer to his decades-long list of credits. The Oscar-winning actor announced Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience on Friday, June 19, a 12-track album described as a 100-year cinematic journey through the blues, set for release August 7 via Decca Records.
Freeman serves as both producer and narrator on the project, which features contributions from Taj Mahal, Keb’ Mo’, Lawrence “Boo” Mitchell and Shemekia Copeland, along with the Chineke! Orchestra. The album opens with a take on Blind Willie Johnson’s “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground” and traces the genre’s evolution from the Mississippi Delta onward, closing with a cover of “I Lied to You” from the Oscar-nominated film Sinners, a film whose score helped reintroduce the blues to a younger mainstream audience last year.
“Rooted in stories carried from West Africa to the American South, the blues became a testament to the unbroken human spirit, the sound of America’s past and present, and the heartbeat of a culture that refused to be forgotten,” Freeman said in a statement.
To mark Juneteenth, Freeman released the album’s first single, a cover of Son House’s 1965 classic “Death Letter Blues,” featuring Taj Mahal on lead vocals and slide guitar alongside a cinematic string section.
“I heard the blues for the first time on my grandmother’s porch in the Mississippi Delta, and it has never left me,” Freeman said. “Son House was one of the great truth-tellers of that tradition. Taj Mahal is one of the great truth-tellers of this one. Releasing this on Juneteenth is not just symbolic, it is the truth of where this music comes from and who made it. I hope people listen and remember.”
Producer Eric Meier echoed that sentiment. “This music was born from the same history that Juneteenth commemorates,” he said. “‘Death Letter Blues’ is one of the rawest, most honest pieces in the American songbook, and hearing Taj Mahal inhabit it with a full symphony behind him, recorded between the hallowed walls of Royal Studios and Abbey Road, is something that is groundbreaking and unique. We’re incredibly proud to introduce our album with this track.”
Freeman, who was born in Memphis and raised in the Mississippi Delta, is also co-owner of the Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Mississippi. While this marks his most significant venture into music, it is not his first appearance on a record. He was featured on B.o.B’s 2012 song “Bombs Away” and served as narrator on Metro Boomin and 21 Savage’s 2020 album Savage Mode II, as well as Metro Boomin’s 2022 album Heroes & Villains.
Freeman will support the new album with a three-date tour, including stops in Houston on August 7, Memphis on September 26, and Gulfport, Mississippi, on October 17. He currently stars in the Paramount+ series Lioness and recently narrated the Netflix documentary series The Dinosaurs.
The full tracklist for Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience is below.
- Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground – Morgan Freeman ft. Keith Johnson
- Crossroads – Super Chikan
- Death Letter Blues – Taj Mahal
- Dust My Broom – Lady Adrena
- The Thrill Is Gone – Alvin Youngblood Hart
- Cadillac Assembly Line – Keb’ Mo’
- Somebody’s Knockin’ – Anthony Big A Sherrod
- Traveling Riverside Blues – Shemekia Copeland
- I’ll Take You There – Tiernii Jackson ft. Stax Music Academy Choir
- Love Me Or Leave Me – Anthony Big A Sherrod
- Someday – Anthony Big A Sherrod
- I Lied To You – Keith Johnson