***1/2 Odetta

ONE GRAIN OF SAND

(Vanguard)

Like Sweet Honey in the Rock and the late Paul Robeson, Odetta booms out centuries of black oppression and injustice. Yet deep dignity is a cornerstone of her art. With only bassist Bill Lee (father of Spike) to accompany her powerful voice and acoustic guitar, this heavily traditional reissue presents the early-'60s folk boom at its best: passionate performance, arresting songs, and the immaculate Vanguard sound.

Odetta's tight vocal control here reflects her early operatic training in a Marian Anderson style. Years away was the relaxed freeing up of her voice that she displayed recently at the Regattabar with the New Black Eagle Jazz Band. And on the subject of freedom, lines like "Moses, Moses, don't let King Pharaoh overtake you" speak to escaping slaves in the ante-bellum South as much as to the children of Israel. Although the disc transcends racial lines, it still bursts with the dreams and despair of bygone black America.

-- Bruce Sylvester