photo by Dino Perrucci

This Friday, Nov. 1, Orange Music will release a new album from late New Orleans legend Dr. John, Big Band Voodoo, a posthumous collection of live tracks from a 1995 performance in Germany, and today we premiere one of the tunes, a woozy version of the jazz standard “I’m Confessin’ (That I Love You).”

Dr. John (real name Mac Rebennack) recorded Big Band Voodoo with the one of Germany’s top jazz ensembles, the WDR Big Band, and an archive of the performance was only recently unearthed by Dr. John’s longtime friend and manager Stanley Chaisson as part of some reminiscing the two shared as the musician’s health declined, ultimately leading to Rebennack’s death earlier this year.

“‘I’m Confessin’ (That I Love You)’…first recorded December 1929. Mac and I brought this song up as a ‘maybe’ for recording,” Chaisson tells Relix. “So he and I looked up its history and man, oh man—guys like Van Morrison, Louis Armstrong, Tony Bennett and Wynton Marsalis had recorded it. So we started thinking, ‘Man, what is it about this song that makes it that good?’ Well, Mac started playing around and fooling with the sheet music and, next thing I knew, I heard a sound from that piano, the gravelly voice and a feeling from his heart, and I said, ‘Wow, we are going to cut this one!’ The expression on Mac’s face after playing it a couple of times—that smile he would give ya—man oh man, what a performance. Remember, it’s a great standard, and when Wynton Marsalis did it, it was distinctive—they just put New Orleans into it. You will get many memories from listening to this one… Enjoy.” 

Hear Dr. John’s “I’m Confessin’ (That I Love You)” below, and pre-order Big Band Voodoo here.