Motherhood is a salient subject if ever there was one. Yet few jazz musicians ever touch on it in their work, never mind dedicating an entire record to the topic. The real or keenly felt need to keep up with the Joneses in a musical atmosphere that typically applauds and promotes standard bearers, hyper-masculine happenings, politically charged firebrands, and cutting-edge quests doesn't leave much room for an honest and open-hearted look at the scope of selflessness and self-discovery involved with maternal matters. The truth is that it takes serious bravery and being real—two things that are in surprisingly short supply nowadays—to show yourself and share a good deal about this journey, and Brenda Earle Stokes is one of the seemingly few willing to go here.
Consciously or not, this Canadian-born, New York City-based pianist-vocalist-composer began to contemplate exploring motherhood through song as she captured thoughts, fragments and lyrics in a notebook while pushing her young son's stroller around her neighborhood. Eight years later, during a residency at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Stokes—armed with her written musings, voice memos, perspective and experience(s)—wrote eight compositions in nine days, essentially birthing this project.
Few stones are left unturned here as Stokes gives a candid look at motherhood in her own inimitable voice. "The Endless Wait"—the opener, with some of the leader's most moving singing, plus ace trumpet work from Ingrid Jensen—offers outward expression for the mind in pregnancy, contemplating possibilities, time and ties to the generations. In doing so it introduces confessional qualities in Stokes' songcraft that carry across the entire program.