Morgan Freeman album traces 100 years of the blues

Morgan Freeman is a producer and narrator on “Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience,” a 12-track album that traces the evolution of the blues from the 1930s to the present and is scheduled for release Friday, The Associated Press reported. Freeman does not perform on the record, the AP said.

The project grew out of Freeman’s longtime involvement in Clarksdale, Mississippi, where he and partners then-Mayor Bill Luckett and Howard Stovall opened the Ground Zero Blues Club about 25 years ago. “There was no place where we could guarantee that you could go in and hear it,” Freeman told The Associated Press. “So, we had to establish that.”

The album grew from a touring show called “Morgan Freeman’s Symphonic Blues Experience,” which pairs blues artists with classical, symphonic arrangements. Eric Meier, Freeman’s partner and co-producer, told the AP the live show was pared from nearly two hours to about 45 minutes across 12 tracks and includes video vignettes and narration recorded at the Clarksdale club.

The record features artists including Taj Mahal, Keb’ Mo’, Shemekia Copeland, Tiernii Jackson, the Stax Music Academy Choir and the Chineke! Orchestra of London, the AP reported. Freeman opens the album with narration over a rendition of Blind Willie Johnson’s 1927 song “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground,” calling the blues “music that gave voice to a people, to their pain, their hope and their resilience,” he told the AP.

The final track features Muddy Waters’ great-nephew Keith Johnson covering Raphael Saadiq and Ludwig Göransson’s “I Lied to You” from the 2025 film “Sinners.” Meier told the AP the album project predates the film but called the overlap “a wonderful coincidence.” The album is eligible for the 2027 Grammy Awards, and Meier said they will submit it in multiple categories. “I want it,” Freeman told the AP when asked about adding a Grammy to his awards shelf.

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