I Plan to Stay a Believer: The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield

I Plan to Stay a Believer is the definitive document of William Parker's The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield project, comprised of exuberant concert recordings spanning the past decade. Bassist/composer William Parker is among the most active and highly regarded musicians performing today. The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield is the first project in his thirty-five year career devoted to the music of another composer: here interpolating the mighty Mayfield songbook with an equally mighty eight-piece band. Curtis Mayfield was a prophet, a preacher, a revolutionary, a humanist, and a griot - words that all apply to Parker himself. I Plan to Stay a Believer is the definitive document of this project, with fully exuberant performances of each piece drawn from concert recordings spanning the past decade. Included are two pieces from the group's very first 2001 performance in Paris with a chorus of ninety children, and another pair from New York in 2008 that feature a full gospel choir.