Marion Williams: Surely God Is Able (SpiritFeel/Shanachie)

COMMENTATORS OFTEN place the Olympian gospel singer Marion Williams, a thriving veteran who got her start singing with the Ward Sisters during the late Forties, among the finest vocalists anywhere in American music. Surely God Is Able, Williams's third album since she resumed recording in 1986 under the guidance of historian and producer Anthony Heilbut, demonstrates why. Done in Philadelphia and New York with subtly varied bands and accompanists (on piano, organ, bass, guitar, drums) cast for different songs and sessions, the album offers a phenomenal concert of such rhythmic black church classics as 'Didn't It Rain' and the title song, plus statelier hymns, like the stark, sublime 'The Day Is Past and Gone'.