Moses Sumney links with Syd and Meshell Ndegeocello for an updated rendition of “Hey Girl,” retooled as “Hey Girl (s).”Hey Girl (s)” connects two generations of R&B outliers in a promise to wait for love in an arrangement of coy rhythm, space, and a saxophone blowing jazz phrases. Sumney’s Sophcore EP came out in 2024, and this remix is his first release of 2025. He fulfilled a dream by working with Ndegeocello, who he cites as a major influence. The R&B/Funk legend who just won another Grammy for Best Alternative Jazz Album was honored to work with Sumney. Syd ended 2024 with the “I Need It” duet with Tank. Sumney’s Sophcore showed up last August after releasing his double album, grae, in 2020. The singer has a busy year planned with the recent announcement that he is the face of Rabanne’s Million Gold fragrance and his role as Feste in Public Theatre’s TWELFTH NIGHT. He will join the cast, which includes Lupita Ny’ongo, Sandra Oh, Peter Dinklage, and Jesse Tyler Ferguson, and runs from August 21 until September 14th. Last summer he starred in the horror movie MaXXXine. 

Meshell Ndegeocello shares “Love” from her forthcoming No More Water:  The Gospel of James Baldwin and performs her second Tiny Desk Concert for their Black Music Month celebration. “Love” fetes vulnerability and connection in a shower of hi-hats, sweet melody, sacred choruses, and Meshell’s funk-wielding bass. She performed the single along with “Travel,”  and “Thus Sayeth The Lord,” from the album. “Virgo” is from her 2023 album The Omnichord Realbook and “Outside My Door” is from her 1993 debut album Plantation Lullabies. No More Water will be released on Baldwin’s centennial August 2nd and Ndegeocello will headline the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn Festival. 

                                                                       Tour Dates 

July 5 – Love Supreme Festival – East Sussex, United Kingdom
July 7 – Casa del Jazz – Rome, Italy
July 8 – Bremen Theater – Copenhagen, Denmark
July 10 – Marseille Jazz des Cinq Continents – Marseille, France
July 12-14 – North Sea Jazz Festival “Artist In Residence” – Rotterdam, Netherlands
July 16 – Jazz a Sete Festival – Sete, France
July 19 – Festival Jazz en Ville – Vannes, France
July 21 – Stuttgart Jazz Open Festival – Stuttgart, Germany
July 23 – Jazz in Marciac – Marciac, France
Aug. 2 – BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn – Brooklyn, NY
Aug. 4 – Newport Jazz Festival – Newport, RI
Aug. 7 – Denver Botanic Gardens – Denver, CO
Aug. 8 – Ravinia Festival – Highland Park, IL
Sept. 15 – New Mexico Jazz Festival – Santa Fe, NM
Sept. 16 – MIM – Phoenix, AZ
Sept. 20 – The Center for the Arts at the Armory – Somerville, MA
Sept. 21 – Empire State Plaza Performing Arts Center – Albany, NY
Sept. 22 – Wexner Center for the Arts – Columbus, OH
Sept. 26 – Infinite Dream Festival – Iowa City, IA
Sept. 28 – Wisconsin Union Theater – Madison, WI
Sept. 29 – Door Community Auditorium – Fish Creek, WI
Oct. 3 – World Café Live – Philadelphia, PA
Oct. 5 – The Music Center at Strathmore – North Bethesda, MD
Oct. 6 – New Jersey Performing Arts Center – Newark, NJ
Oct. 31 – JazzOnze+ Festival Lausanne – Lausanne, Switzerland
Nov. 1 – Enjoy Jazz-Alte Feuerwache – Mannheim, Germany
Nov. 3-4 – Stadtgarten Konzertsaal – Cologne, Germany
Nov. 6-7 – Musikbrauerei – Berlin, Germany
Nov. 9 – Rockit Festival – Groningen, Netherlands
Nov. 10 – Le Guess Who? Festival – Utrecht, Netherlands
Nov. 11 – De Roma – Antwerp, Belgium
Nov. 12-13 – New Morning – Paris, France
Nov. 15 – Koko – London, United Kingdom
Dec. 2-5 – Jazz Alley – Seattle, WA
Nov. 7 – Walter Art Center – Minneapolis, MN

Meshell Ndegeocello has announced her next album, No More Water: The Gospel Of James Baldwin. The album originates in a 2016 concert at The Harlem Stage Gatehouse during their annual showcase honoring Baldwin. Ndegeocello had read Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time the previous year and found it  “life-changing” and a “spiritual text.” Her interaction with Baldwin’s work came at an important time for her. She says, “It came when I was ready to look in the mirror. I’ve had to play Plantation Lullabies at a few shows. Looking back, I had an interesting perspective, but the dialogue was limited. It was more like a cathartic experience for a young person of color, whereas now I’m going, ‘How can I get us all to love each other? How can I get us all to see this for what it is?’” The music is modeled after the Black church with themes of Baptism, testimony, praise and resurrection. Ndegeocello co-produced the album with Chris Bruce and is working with frequent collaborators like Justin Hicks and Josh Johnson. Esteemed poet Staceyann Chin also appears on No More Water. “Travel” is the first single and Hicks takes over with his poetic answer to Baldwin’s suicide motif. Chin’s words in “Raise The Roof” holds racist murdering cops accountable  and rants against a system that has devalued Black life for more than 400 years. The anger Baldwin had towards America for its treatment of Black people and his trenchant essays about the trauma of racism have a sonic counterpart in the honesty and fire of both singles. 

 No More Water is Ndegecello’s second album for Blue Note. The Omnichord Realbook released in 2023 was her debut album for the storied jazz label. No More Water will be released on August 2, 2024, which would have been Baldwin’s 100th birthday. 

Meshell Ndegeocello’s curated Red, Hot & Ra: The Magic City is a tribute to the work of the late Afro-jazz futurist Sun Ra. The album is the latest in the Red Hot Organization’s series of projects started three decades ago to raise awareness and money for A.I.D.S. Ndegeocello uses Sun Ra as a muse to produce abstract sketches of his work instead of cover songs. Every composition is original and reflects Sun Ra’s visionary status by tapping the creativity of contemporary voices. In some places, Sun Ra actually appears when he is sampled recanting the band’s travels and his philosophy on “Solipsistic Panacea (Black Antique)” and “Departure Of The Seven Sisters.” Ndegecello delves into the spirit of Sun Ra’s expression with a variety of collaborators including Marshall Allen who is the leader of the late musician’s Arkestra. Hip-Hop/punk rocker Pink Siifu provides ethereal poetry and scraggly-whispered rap on “El-soul The Companion, Traveler” and “Yet Differently Not- Mars Hall (in).” 

“#9 Venus The Living Myth” pays homage to Sun Ra’s respect for other planets and his avant-garde jazz with a cacophony of saxophones, percussion eruptions, choral-like chants, and quotes from the master himself. The Justin Hicks-penned “Reproductive Manatees” has Sun Ra’s early proto-funk keyboard experimentation and parts that sound like sung prayers. Ndegeocello’s creative decisions encapsulate Sun Ra’s sonic and philosophical creed of jazz-based musical freedom and respect for other life forms and planets.The Magic City presents all the spookiness, improvisation, mystery, and elusiveness of Sun Ra and his Arkestra who were waiting on aliens decades before George Clinton’s mothership landed in D.C.