Poetry

Poetry on vinyl: poems between jazz and soul

In short: Poetry covers records on which poems are spoken – on their own or with music. Especially in the fifties and sixties poets and jazz musicians joined verse and jazz; Gil Scott-Heron later turned it into spoken songs with soul and funk. The Vinyl Room currently has 13 poetry records.

What are poetry records?

Poetry and music: Gil Scott-Heron with “Small Talk At 125th And Lenox” and “I'm New Here” and the compilation “Jazz Canto Vol. 1”.

Great voices read: Sidney Poitier with “The Poetry Of The Black Man”, James Earl Jones with “Poems From Black Africa” – African poems edited by Langston Hughes –, Marianne Faithfull with Warren Ellis on “She Walks In Beauty”, Luis Carbonell with Cuban stories and a tribute to Federico García Lorca.

What to look for

About half of our poetry records are US editions, many from the sixties and seventies; label, catalogue number and year of release help you tell which edition you have – it’s noted with each copy.

From our stock

First pressings

New in

→ Spoken word · Free jazz · Conscious · Jazz on vinyl · How to spot a first pressing · Grading explained

FAQ

What are poetry records? Records on which poems are spoken – on their own or with music.

What does poetry have to do with jazz? In the fifties and sixties poets read to jazz – words and music became one performance.

Who was Gil Scott-Heron? An American poet and musician (1949–2011) who joined spoken verse with soul, jazz and funk.

Which poetry records do you have? Here, for example, Gil Scott-Heron’s “Small Talk At 125th And Lenox” and Marianne Faithfull and Warren Ellis’s “She Walks In Beauty”.