John Coltrane: Interstellar Space

On 24 September, the evening after what was the incomparable musical master John Coltrane's 100th birthday, his son Ravi concluded a three-night stand at the Blue Note in Hollywood to mark the centennial.  In addition to the saxophonist, there were David Virelles on piano, bassist Dezron Douglas and Jonathan Blake on drums and we sat on the side closer to Blake, whose playing was phenomenal, though Virelles and Douglas were excellent and Coltrane especially inspiring as the group played a range of his songs associated with his father from the mid-1950s to John's death at just age 40 in mid-July 1967.

One of the more surprising songs performed was "Expression," which was one of the last studio recorded pieces, dating from sometime in Spring 1967, and it appears that Ravi chose this beautiful piece for that reason.  After the show, I thanked Ravi for playing that song, while having chatted with some women ahead of me who knew him about his mother Alice's amazing work as a pianist, I added something about her, as well.

Hearing "Expression" as well as well as Blake's complex, propulsive and invigorating drumming, led me to think about Interstellar Space, recorded at one session on 22 February 1967, a week after two of the tunes on Expression and just prior to other pieces that were on that record, or its CD version.  I bought Interstellar Space, which was not released until September 1974, around 1991 when I was on a Coltrane binge, having just discovered his sublime music, and was captivated by this duet with drummer Rashied Ali, with the original LP release of four songs named for the planets Jupiter, Mars, Saturn and Venus.

For many people, Coltrane's music is generally inseparable from the incredible Elvin Jones, whose polyrhythms, impeccable timing and immense power and creativity pushed Coltrane and the other Classic Quartet members, bassist Jimmy Garrison and McCoy Tyner on piano, to incredible levels of intensity.  There's no doubting Elvin's genius, but Ali, unfortunately, didn't get the attention he should have for, first of all, replacing Jones and, secondly, for his vital role in the challenging music of the last couple of years of Coltrane's life and career.

"Challenging" ("difficult" for some) is an operative word for Interstellar Space, but so is "rewarding."  Apparently, Ali showed up to the legendary Rudy Van Gelder's studio expecting a full band, only to be told by Coltrane that it was duet session.  When the drummer asked what they were playing and what tempos, the reply was "whatever you want it to be" with Coltrane adding "I'm going to ring some bells.  You can do an 8-bar intro."  Ali complied and some 36 and 1/2 minutes of material yielded this bracing, explorative and astounding recording in one take.

Ali evidently felt uncertain about his playing, believing he could have played better with some preparation, but he later remarked that the album "really told you the direction he was headed in" and added that "it's really something that has to be listened to and something that has to be felt."  This is definitely the case: Interstellar Space isn't, for this blogger, a record to understand, but to experience.  Coltrane knew he was very ill, perhaps aware he was dying, and this bracing recording seems to reflect that and Ali deserves all the credit possible for making the most of a difficult situation and allowing Coltrane to explore the outer limits (pun definitely intended) of his music.

John Coltrane: Live in Japan

In July 1966, a year before his far-too-early death at age 40, John Coltrane and his quintet toured Japan amid a period of American turmoil.  The escalation of the Vietnam War, riots at Watts in Los Angeles the prior summer, the assassination of Malcolm X earlier in 1965, and the much else marked the period.  In jazz, a tumult was at hand, as well, as so-called "free" jazz arose to the consternation of critics and the horror of traditionalists, while the rise of rock, soul and R&B music were of great concern, as well.

For John Coltrane, who released his masterpiece, A Love Supreme, at the dawn of 1965 and who was one of the most popular jazz musician of his era, his relentless search for expression led him to move further away from more standard forms of harmony, rhythm and melody.  Later that year, he recorded the astounding Ascension, which confounded many fans, as well as critics, but which is a powerful testament to his current musical calling and evocative of Ornette Coleman's large-ensemble masterwork, Free Jazz, from five years earlier.

Towards the end of the year, Coltrane recorded Meditations, which may be seen as an extension of A Love Supreme, but in a far more intense, open and relentlessly searching manner, with the softer "Love" and "Serenity" contrasted with such searing performances as the awesome "The Father, The Son and The Holy Ghost" and the excoriating "Consequences."  1965 was also the year when his famed Classic Quartet with pianist McCoy Tyner, drummer Elvin Jones and bassist Jimmy Garrison was pushed to its limits and then dissolved.

Jones was the first to go, unable to accept the changes that affected his inimitable style, while Tyner was increasingly concerned, as well, about his place and departed not long after.  Garrison remained as the solid grounding force of what was expanding mightily in sound, thanks to the continued presence of Pharoah Sanders and his shrieking and keening saxophone playing juxtaposed to the leader's performances and the additions of Coltrane's wife, Alice, and her stunning exploratory piano work, very different from that of Tyner, and drummer Rashied Ali, whose work fit in extremely well with the new direction.

Recorded at a pair of Tokyo dates on 11 and 22 July, the four-disc Live in Japan  (only one disc of which was previously released in 1973 as a double LP) tests the limits of the listener on every level.  First, the shortest of the half-dozen pieces on three discs is 25 minutes with the longest approaching an hour.  Those used to hearing symphonies or Indian ragas, for example, may have no issue with this at all, but it is more the sonic openness and freedom that is, perhaps, the greater challenge.  As noted above, typical ideas of melodic expression, rhythmic underpinnings and harmony among the ensemble are deconstructed and refashioned.

The sheer intensity and power of these performances can be overwhelming, even though there are moments of calm and reflection, and coruscating solos, filled with microphonics and overtones, by Coltrane and Sanders are countered by the expansive, shimmering and swirling solos of Alice Coltrane.  Garrison, as always, holds down the bottom with precision and power and, for those who take the time to list, solos to open "Crescent" with innovation and invention.  Ali's endurance is truly remarkable as he makes incredible use of his kit through these lengthy and dense pieces and his solo on "Leo" is awesome.

The two versions of "Peace on Earth" are the most ballad-like and especially powerful given the war in Vietnam and the fact that it was just two decades after America's atomic bomb attacks on Japan.  "Leo" is especially intense and any expectation (as with 1966's Live at the Village Vanguard Again) that the signature "My Favorite Things" will be anything like the hit 1960 recorded version is soon dashed by the complete reworking of the standard.

This was purchased new in 1991 and memories are very clear of sitting on an apartment balcony and taking this in through several dedicated listening sessions.  Coltrane was a near-obsession, starting the prior year with, of course, the My Favorite Things record but including his freer work, and Live in Japan is perhaps the most daunting listening experience on multiple levels, but highly rewarding at the end of some four hours of among the most intense and immersive music out there (and "out there" is meant literally!)

John Coltrane With Eric Dolphy: Evenings at the Village Gate

To hear some critics, with their infinite reservoirs of wisdom, tell it in 1961, the inclusion of the masterful multi-instrumentalist and composer Eric Dolphy in John Coltrane's band was a blasphemy against jazz.  The Los Angeles native wrote and played in unconventional and highly distinctive ways and to those unimpressed ears, his work was harsh, noisy, dissonant and not tonal enough.  

Not unlike those who could not wrap their heads (ears) around other great innovators of the era, whether it was Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor or others, these critics were also generally unhappy with Coltrane's move into more experimental territory after he left Atlantic Records to join the upstart Impulse! label, where among his first recordings were the amazing performances from November 1961 at the Village Vanguard in New York City.

The album released early in 1962 with three tracks "Spiritual," "Softly, As In a Morning Sunrise," and the astounding "Chasin' the Trane" were divisive among many so-called experts, who decried the leader's explorations into the varieties of sound generated by his soprano and tenor saxophone playing.  Dolphy played bass clarinet on "Spiritual" and did so on "India" when that tune and "Impressions" appeared on the 1963 release titled after the latter.  In 1997, however, a 4-disc set of the complete Village Vanguard recordings provided devotees with an aural feast with Dolphy and Trane joined by pianist McCoy Tyner, drummer Elvin Jones, and bassists Reggie Workman (the sole survivor of these recordings and now 86 years old) and Jimmy Garrison.

A fascinating complement to these recordings is Evenings at the Village Gate, released last year after the tapes, recorded by engineer Rich Alderson with the venue's new sound system, were discovered at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts by an archivist working on Bob Dylan recordings, as the folk artist was recorded at the Village Gate that year, as well.  These tapes were from August 1961, but with the same sextet format and with Art Davis as the other bassist.

Coltrane and Dolphy famously issued a published answer to the naysayers in Down Beat magazine, but this album and the Vanguard tracks should suffice in hindsight because Trane's observation that Dolphy broadened the band's sound as well as freed its musicians to take the music in new directions is on the mark.  All that critical angst is a reminder that innovators have to be allowed to pursue their passion for finding new ways to express themselves and those wedded to "tradition" shouldn't stand in the way or criticize honest and authentic artistic endeavor.

These pieces range from 10 to 22 minutes allowing the band to explore at a comfortable and organic pace and for soloists to take their showcases wherever they need to go.  The hit "My Favorite Things," which would be reprocessed into much freer territory in subsequent years, "Impressions," and, especially, "Africa," long a favorite of this listener, are especially impressive, while "Greensleeves," part of Trane's repertoire at the time is also taken to new levels of expression.  The surprise here, perhaps, is "When Lights Are Low," in which the 1930s chestnut sounds somewhat out of place on one hand, but, on the other, shows what innovators can do to both respect and expand upon tradition.

Sadly, Dolphy died in 1964 at age 36 after falling into a diabetic coma and a 9-disc box set of his complete Prestige recordings is a phenomenal document of his underappreciated career.  Coltrane went on to greater success, peaking with the transformative A Love Supreme, but was soon stricken with liver cancer from which he died at age 40 in 1967.  These two giants, criticized as they were in 1961, left behind some of the greatest music ever produced and this is a great document to show that.

John Coltrane: A Love Supreme, Live in Seattle

What an amazing circumstance it was when the Impulse! label released, in 2021, this astounding document that was long hidden in the possession of saxophonist and teacher Joe Brazil and which was one of the very few live recordings of John Coltrane's transcendent suite, A Love Supreme.  Recorded on house equipment at The Penthouse club in Seattle on 2 October 1965, this music featured the master and his classic quartet of pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison and drummer Elvin Jones, supplemented by bassist Donald Rafael Garrett, alto sax player Carlos Ward, and the great Pharoah Sanders, who departed this world last September.

After several years of working nearly exclusively with Garrison, Jones and Tyner and reaching the limits of what he felt could be done with modal jazz, Coltrane sought new ways of expression, with instrumentation, composition, improvisation, harmony and time and in other ways.  Not long after this recording, Tyner and Jones left the band, uncomfortable with the new directions pursued by Coltrane, while Garrison remained until the leader's death untimely death from liver cancer at age 40 in July 1967.

Not surprisingly, whereas the studio version of this masterpiece, recorded in December 1964, was conceived and played with precision, power, passion and no filler, this version, more than the other live recording, from the Antibes Jazz Festival in France in late June 1965, is looser, more open and free, and  often filled with explosive intensity unrivaled in jazz.  There were, too, the growing contradictions within the expanded band, especially for Tyner, a staggering pianist, but whose lyrical playing, complex soloing and distinctive comping often seems lost or out-of-place in the maelstrom—his solo on the third part, "Pursuance," however, is outstanding.  On the other hand, Garrison, the consummate accompanist, played well with Garrett and Jones, who often expressed frustration with the new manner of performance, more than keeps things moving with his great polyrhythmic playing for this unpredictable and fiery ensemble.

A lot has been said about Sanders and his often-abrasive and emotive style of playing, but he proved to be an excellent foil and complement, as well as an inspiration, to Coltrane, who was absorbing a good deal of "free jazz," most especially that of Albert Ayler (Trane made sure that Sanders and Ayler were signed to Impulse!).  Ward has some fine moments, as well, settling in somewhere between Sanders and Coltrane in terms of style and approach.  With respect to the leader, he was clearly inspired by new musicians and ways of writing and playing and making every effort to plunge forward fearlessly with records like Ascension, Om, and Meditations, while live recordings such as the ones in Seattle, Japan and the second Village Vanguard set show the full steam ahead approach that prevailed until the master died of liver cancer in 1967, at just age 40.

There was a lot of controversy about Coltrane's direction after 1964, but it's also understandable why he went where he did.  To grow is to change and this push into freer music was the only way he could see to go.  This end period was a world away from the hit version of My Favorite Things or his Standards album, but it is fascinating to follow him in those last years and this is a revelation for that era.

John Coltrane: My Favorite Things

In 1990, when it was decided to explore jazz beyond the few recordings heard from the great Miles Davis, the two names that came up when figuring who to hear were the amazing Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane.  As much as Coleman astounded with his unusual approaches to harmony and time, hearing My Favorite Things, particularly its widely known title track in which the leader's soprano sax, rarely heard in those days, was a revelation.  As great as that tune is, there are also the exceptional covers of "Summertime," "Everytime We Say Goodbye," and "But Not For Me."  While I bought a number of Ornette albums at that time, I became obsessed with Trane and acquired as many recordings as my pocketbook would allow.

It wasn't until I acquired the box set, the strangely named The Heavyweight Champion: John Coltrane, The Complete Atlantic Recordings that the realization hit that there were just six days between 21-26 October 1960 when the saxophonist and his band of McCoy Tyner (who just left us in March) on piano, drummer Elvin Jones and bassist Steve Davis (Tyner's brother-in-law and a largely unknown figure) churned out almost two dozen songs that included those on My Favorite Things, released in March 1961, as well as pieces for Coltrane Jazz, which came out just a month prior, Coltrane Plays the Blues, issued in July 1962, and Coltrane's Sound, released in June 1964—the latter two hitting the shops well after Trane signed with Impulse and took his music to another level of brilliance.  That was a remarkable week, with the peak being the quartet of classic renderings on this still-astounding album.

John Coltrane: Blue Train

This 1957 recording is where John Coltrane came into his own as a leader after spending the last couple of years as a rapidly growing member of Miles Davis' great quintet with Red Garland, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones.  It was also the year that Coltrane kicked the heroin habit that inhibited his development and when his half-year stint with Thelonious Monk helped him advance dramatically as a musician,

This was a one-off recording deal with the famed Blue Note Records and the differences between what Alfred Lion offered and what Coltrane got in his contract with Bob Weinstein and his Prestige Records is literally clear.  The production values were so much better and Coltrane took full advantage of working at Rudy Van Gelder's legendary stdio by combining great tunes with an excellent band.

The former included the superb blues title track, the excellent up-tempo "Moment's Notice," "Locomotion," "Lazy Bird," all Coltrane originals and a cover of the old pop chestnut "I'm Old Fashioned."  Then, there's the band, which included Coltrane's mates from the Davis group Chambers and Jones, who were locked in tight on that rhythm, the fine pianist Kenny Drew, and the potent duo of trumpeter Lee Morgan, of "The Sidewinder" fame several years later, and trombonist Curtis Fuller, who is the only living member of this tremendous group.

Coltrane was in what Ira Gitler somewhat dismissively called his "sheets of sound" period, issuing blistering runs on his tenor, while also demonstrating what that moniker overshadowed, his command of phrasing, richness of sound, and deft handling of complicated passages, while his ballad work on "I'm Old Fashioned" showed the tremendous growth he'd made recently.  Morgan is powerful, passionate and intense, demonstrating great technique and power in his playing, while Fuller provides a relaxed and refined counterpoint in his playing against the intensity of the other horn players.  As for Chambers and Jones, they hold everything together beautifully.

Putting together a great slate of pieces, handling five crack musicians in a way that coalesces their talents to the service of the songs and the session, and demonstrating remarkable transformations in his musicianship reveals that Coltrane had really arrived.  There are some very good Prestige recordings in his catalog, but Blue Train stands out as the best of his late Fifties work.

I only have the disc and not the artwork for this album, but, years ago, a friend bought me a framed poster of Blue Train that has hung in my office at work for close to twenty years, so that's what the image shows.

John Coltrane: Giant Steps

This is the album, recorded in May and December 1959 and released on Atlantic Records, that fully established John Coltrane as a masterful player, composer and bandleader, when it was released in January 1960.  On the heels of Miles Davis's Kind oi Blue, on which Coltrane was a stellar contributor, and out the same year as Ornette Coleman's revolutionary Free Jazz, Giant Steps was one of the indicators of where jazz was heading in the new decade.

The paths (there are almost always several) would not be easy to trod, as old-school critics howled in derision and anger about what the so-called "avant garde" was doing, while clinging to the old verities of bop, hard bop and the preexistng styles that were being challenged.

Coltrane, universally known as a kind, gentle, spiritual man not given to contentious arguments about anything, became the object of vitriol and scorn totally unfair to both the man and musician.  More than a half-century later, it seems quaint and laughable to imagine Coltrane's "giant steps" towards a different way of playing jazz being a threat to anyone.

The damnations were enough, evidently, so that a series of albums through 1964 showed Trane moving more frequently into more melodic and traditional territory, through "My Favorite Things", albums with Duke Ellington and Johnny Hartman, the recording of classic standards, and right up to the solemn and gorgeous Crescent.

But, it was first Giant Steps, then elements of the remarkable Africa/Brass, and especially the staggering Live at the Village Vanguard (its complete package gives the fan three additional discs of glorious playing at that December 1961 engagement) that invited the withering scrutiny of critics, most of whom couldn't play an instrument, compose or do anything that gave them the mantle and aura of authority they assumed.

So, the music.  The original seven-track album has classic after classic. The mind-blowing speed, precision and technical mastery of the title track is legendary and it has been a challenge for sax players ever since to take the tune on and do what they can with it.  "Cousin Mary," named for Coltrane's relation and keeper of the flame when it came to his Philadelphia home being a historic site, was long a standard in Trane's repertoire.

"Syeeda's Song Flute," named after Trane's adopted daughter by his first wife, is another joyous piece.  "Mr. P.C.," a tribute to longtime Davis and Coltrane bassist Paul Chambers, is one of the more recognizable melodies in Trane's discography and a live favorite for years.

Finally, there's "Naima," in honor of the composer's first wife, and simply one of the finest ballads, not only of Coltrane's work, but of anyone's.  Like "My Favorite Things," it was a standard piece even when the music went totally free and to hear a version of the song from, say, the second Village Vanguard album in 1966, compared to the earlier one from Giant Steps is an interesting way to hear just how much Coltrane's sound developed over those five years.

Trane was still about a year away from solidifying his band with the "classic quartet" of McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison and Elvin Jones.  He had Chambers as his anchor at the bass, Art Taylor on drums and Tommy Flanagan at the piano.  For "Naima," drummer Jimmy Cobb and pianist Wynton Kelly, both from the Davis band and Kind of Blue, brought their soft, sensitive touches to the classic.  Then, for "Giant Steps," Lex Humphries was at the kit and Cedar Walton played piano.  All of these musicians were excellent at their instruments, though there has been much said especially about the struggles some had with the speed and complexity of some of the tunes, particularly the title track.

But, Coltrane kept trying other musicians on subsequent records until he first secured Tyner, then Jones and, finally, Garrison and the "classic quartet" went on that momentous four-year run that culminated with A Love Supreme in 1965.  Still, even if Trane's greatest work was in that 1961-65 period with that quartet, Giant Steps, following from the great start of 1957's Blue Train, was the album that put Coltrane in the front ranks of jazz's greatest players, writers and leaders.

John Coltrane: Crescent

It's hard to argue with the oft-stated view that the pinnacle of the amazing John Coltrane's recorded work came with two classic albums recorded in 1964.  At the end of the year was the masterpiece A Love Supreme, covered here previously.  Earlier was the majestic Crescent, recorded on 27 April and 1 June, and reflecting the telepathic relationship of the leader with his remarkable band members, including pianist McCoy Tyner, drummer Elvin Jones, and bassist Jimmy Garrison.

The record is built around three pieces showing a highly reflecting, ruminative and meditative side to Coltrane that had been heard before but reached its apex on this album.  Trane's solos are phenomenal, as are those of Tyner, and the rhythm section of Garrison and Jones hold everything together for the soloists to build from.

The title piece is driven by the leader's keening and emotive statement of the gorgeous melody with Tyner accompanying simply but beautifully, while Jones employs long rolls and uses splashes of cymbals to great effect.  After about a minute and a half, a steady rhythm ensues and Coltrane soloes with economy and emotion, though there are moments where he employs overtones and cycles of repetitive notes that hint at the freer forms he moved into the next year.

"Wise One" starts with a gorgeous opening by Tyner before Coltrane comes in with a mournful and memorable melody accompanied by Jones' exclusive and excellent use of cymbal patterns.  At about three minutes in, a Latin-like rhythmic pattern comes in and Tyner soloes sensationally by keeping things simple and subdued.  At 4:45 or so, Coltrane comes in with perfect timing and keeps the mood Tyner had established--for a while.  He builds up gradually and increases the speed and intensity over his solo, while Jones focuses mainly on the cymbals for his rhythm, rather than the bass drum or snare.  Garrison, all the while, holds down the bottom end solidly and basically.

"Bessie's Blues" can be heard as an aberration, being a playful midtempo blues with a sparkling Tyner solo being the highlight and Coltrane using some overtones on his solo while Tyner lays out, but it might also be thought of as a nice break between the subdued, but substantial and sublime tracks that form the core of the album.

The third piece of that core is the lengthier and pretty "Lonnie's Lament," where Coltrane states the theme to Tyner's impressive filigreed backing and more of Jones' fine cymbal touches before the band comes in to a steady rhythm, highlighted by Garrison's stronger presence here than on portions of the album.

Tyner soloes first and is wonderfully restrained with his notes cascading sometimes like raindrops (you can almost imagine a scene in which it is raining while the song is playing) and other times his trademark block chords drive his work.  It is really a spectacular piece of work from one of the great pianists in jazz and who was truly coming into his own at age 26 as a leader as well as Coltrane's sideman.

A little after six minutes, Garrison comes in for his only solo of the record.  It's become commonplace for people to groan whenever a jazz bassist soloes, which is really a shame, because Garrison was one of the best.  His playing is always of interest in terms of dynamics, tone, strength and melodic statement.  This performance is a reminder of his immense talent.

Towards the end, Trane comes in to restate the theme and take the piece out--a generous display by the leader to allow two of his compatriots the opportunity to show the best of their art.

Which leads to the showcase for the third of his band members:  the closer is a Jones highlight called, naturally, "The Drum Thing,"  Notably, though, this track isn't just a centerpiece of the speed and power for which Jones was justly famed, but because his polyrhythmic skills are displayed fully here.

Jones starts off with a muted rumble of his drums and Garrison playing a simple twice-repeated riff of the same note while Trane plays a simple melody that is attractive on its own terms.  Then, the masterful drummer launches into his staggering solo, thundering, rumbling, pounding with total discipline and yet sounding like several percussionists at the same time.  It's not that there aren't plenty of other masterful solos in Jones' recorded catalog, but this one has a sense of restraint even amongst the power, speed and intensity that sets it apart.  This is a great close to a fantastic album.

Amazingly, the Coltrane quartet came back at the end of 1964 with something even better.  The fact that A Love Supreme was released not long after Crescent has, perhaps, overshadowed the latter.  However, Crescent is a landmark album and was something of an encapsulation and summation of what made the Quartet such a special band.  This was perfected on A Love Supreme but that shouldn't diminish the achievement of its predecessor.

The photo of Coltrane is from the 8-disc The Classic Quartet—Complete Impulse! Studio Recordings set issued in 1998.

Archie Shepp: Four for Trane

Tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp's Fire Music was highlighted here before, as the first Shepp recording this blogger heard back in the early Nineties.  The predecessor and the leader's first recording for the Impulse label paid homage to John Coltrane, Shepp's supporter who lobbied hard to have the label sign the young firebrand.  To date, Shepp had played for a period with Cecil Taylor and recorded with Don Cherry, formerly with Ornette Coleman, and others in the New York Contemporary Five.

Four for Trane was not only a tribute to the jazz giant who got him signed to a major jazz label, but a way for Shepp to combine his deep blues feel with a very fine band and the arranging abilities of trombonist Roswell Rudd, who worked frequently with Shepp in the 60s.  The title directly refers to four of Coltrane's pieces covered by the band and this was a smart move by the leader, because it was said to producer Bob Thiele had to really be convinced by Trane to sign and work with Shepp.  This album rewarded Coltrane's persistence.

The opening track "Syeeda's Song Flute" is something else--Rudd's complex and rich arrangement shone through beautifully, as it does on the gorgeous "Naima," one of Trane's greatest compositions.  The way the various horns engage in interplay on both pieces, but especially on the intro to "Naima" is something to behold and it's a shame Rudd didn't get more credit for his arranging work.  Moreover, the other two tunes, "Mr. Syms" and "Cousin Mary" are also solid blues pieces and they provide apt forums for Shepp's earthy and raw playing to their best advantage.

Also a standout throughout this recording is the underappreciated altoist John Tchicai, a half-African, half-Danish player, who performed with Shepp in the New York Contemporary Five and went on to work on Coltrane's free ensemble album, Ascension.  Rudd also plays well and his instrument proved to be an interesting counterpoint to the saxes in the septet.  Trumpeter Alan Shorter, brother of the famed tenor player Wayne Shorter, then just getting his name recognition going with the Miles Davis Quintet, doesn't get that much opportunity to solo.

It's the rhythm section that also gets tremendous credit for holding down the bottom and keeping things truly swinging on this album.  Bassist Reggie Workman had played with Coltrane a number of times and was a very reliable, supple and flexible player behind the band.  Drummer Charles Moffett would go on to achieve his best-known work with Ornette Coleman with the great recordings in Copenhagen in 1966 in the two-disc Golden Circle albums already featured here and others.  His timekeeping is relentlessly sure and confident and he and Workman team up beautifully.

The one Shepp original is the provocatively-titled "Rufus (Swung, his face at last to the wind, then his neck snapped)," a tune that appeared later on a Coltrane/Shepp album recorded at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1965.  Tchicai plays fantastically on the opening solo and Shepp comes in with his distinctive earthiness for some excellent interplay and then his own solo, while Workman and Moffett keep things moving with great efficiency and verve.  In a way, "Rufus" was an announcement that, after the fine covers that started the album, Shepp was a fresh, new and exciting voice in the so-called "New Thing" or "Avant-Garde" that was sweeping through jazz in the Sixties.

Shepp followed this record with Fire Music and another excellent album, Mama Too Tight, which will also be featured here in the future.  He spent some time in France recording there at the end of the sixties before returning to America and more Impulse albums.  As jazz continued to decline in popularity, so Shepp's profile dimmed, but he has continued to make excellent music over the years, including a duet album with Dollar Brand that will make an appearance here someday.  He is still with us, as are Workman and Rudd, and Four For Trane is definitely a highlight of his long, interesting and under-recognized career.

The Miles Davis Quintet: The Legendary Prestige Quintet Sessions

After his early development in the bands of the great altoist Charlie Parker followed by his leadership in the so-called "Birth of the Cool" sessions, all in the last half of the 1940s, trumpeter Miles Davis returned from triumph in Europe in 1949 to an indifference in the U.S. that he said fostered his addiction to heroin (after being clean even during his time with the omnivorous Parker).  That descent to hell lasted several years and marked a clear decline in Davis' powers as a player and band leader.

Still, in 1951, as recording technology with the LP was allowing for longer pieces of music and the resulting expanded expression for musicians, Davis signed with the new Prestige label, founded by Bob Weinstock and made a series of recordings that were, generally, hit and miss.

Yet, by 1955, Davis kicked his habit and began making recordings that reflected his healthier status, including works with the great tenor player Sonny Rollins, vibraphonist Milt Jackson, altoist Jackie McLean and others.  He had, however, not had a working band during the first several years of his Prestige era, but that all changed after the trumpeter put on a masterful performance of Thelonious Monk's "Round Midnight" at the 1955 Newport Jazz Festival, which is thought of as marking his true return to prominence in the jazz world.

In fact, his performance at Newport prompted him to pursue a contract at Columbia Records, which would give him better facilities and promotion for his work, but he still had to deliver product to Weinstock for Prestige.  So, Davis worked out a deal in which he could record for Columbia in 1956, but not be able to release anything until he satisfied the terms of his Prestige contract first.  Weinstock was also compensated for his willingness to abide by the terms of the unusual arrangement.

Davis made his initial Columbia recording debut in October 1955 and followed with sessions in June and September 1956.  The resulting album, the classic Round About Midnight (a strange corruption of the Monk composition mentioned above), could not be released until March 1957 in accordance with the Columbia-Prestige deal.

With his future with Columbia (which turned out, probably, to be brighter and longer-lasting than anyone could have imagined) assured, Davis took his new band into the studios of Rudy Van Gelder in New Jersey and quickly recorded enough material in three long sessions in May, October and November 1956 to be the basis of four major albums:  Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet, Relaxin' with the Miles Davis Quintet, Steamin' with the Miles Davis Quintet, and Workin' with the Miles Davis Quintet.  Released between 1957 and 1961, these fine records benefitted from being issues during the years when Davis' Columbia albums, including Kind of Blue, Sketches of Spain, Porgy and Bess and others were establishing the trumpeter as a household jazz name.

This 4-disc set of the Prestige recordings from 1955 and 1956 was issued by Prestige's owner, The Concord Music Group, in 2006 and features an excellent 40-page book with background on the quintet and sessions and some great photos of the band members in the studio and at live gigs.

Unlike the Columbia recordings, in which Davis was given more opportunity to rehearse and record, as well as having access to better studio and recording facilities and equipment, the Prestige sessions were marked by the quick, one-take approach that was favored by Weinstock as closer to a live performance, but also done for economic reasons, given that the label was much smaller.  This doesn't mean the Prestige sessions suffer greatly, but there is a discernible difference in hearing the albums from the respective labels.

As for the band, no one in 1955 knew much about the quartet that Davis recruited.  Pianist Edward "Red" Garland had a light, lyrical touch the leader liked from his years with and admiration for Horace Silver.  Young bassist Paul Chambers had a strong, supple sound and remarkable technique, but was still in his teens and not known when he joined the group, though that soon changed.  Drummer "Philly Joe" Jones was better known and, in fact, had served as a sort of talent scout for his boss and was generally thought to be responsible for pointing Davis towards another Philadelphia musician, tenorist John Coltrane.  Davis and Coltrane had met some years before, though the trumpeter did not apparently remember this when he saw Trane again in 1955.

Once the band began working together, including a long stint at the Café Bohemia, it was apparent that something special was happening, though not without problems.  One was the fact that the other members of the band were heroin addicts and, in Coltrane's case, alcoholics and Davis often had a difficult time keeping his sidemen together to make concerts and sessions.  Coltrane appears to have been the most affected by his addiction and was known to show up at concerts in rumpled, dirty clothing, nodding off on the stage, and otherwise being distracted.  Davis fired members of the band on occasion and even punched Trane in the stomach in a rage after finding his tenor player high.

Coltrane, in fact, was a rough talent even at 30 years of age during these early years with Miles because of his addictions.  Davis frequently kept Trane off the mike at recording sessions when ballads were performed, feeling that his sax player was not well enough developed to play on these sensitive tunes and used him for up-tempo pieces.

It was not until 1957, after Davis punched him and Thelonious Monk, who witnessed the incident, encouraged Trane to join his band, that the tenorist's playing improved markedly.  This was not unlike what Davis had done a few years earlier in kicking his habit and when Trane played in the legendary Monk band at a lengthy engagement at the Five Spot during the latter part of that year, he was clearly a changed man.  In fact, Trane was so superior a player once cleaned up that Davis hired him back and the two went on to make the great Kind of Blue not long afterwards.

The Prestige recordings of 1955 and 1956 are full of remarkable performances, including standards, pieces by Davis, Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, Dave Brubeck, Ahmad Jamal, Sonny Rollings and Trane's first recorded piece, "Trane's Blues."  In addition to the studio sessions over three discs, there is a fourth that comprises two songs performed on The Tonight Show in November 1955 (including awkward introductions by sincere jazz fan and host Steve Allen), two songs at Philadelphia's Blue Note club in December 1956 and four tracks recorded at the Café Bohemia in New York in May 1958, well after the group left Prestige.  An enhanced section provides transcriptions of five Miles solos from two sessions and three live performances, as well.

The rhythm section of Jones and Chambers, with Garland's consistent comping, are excellent and, on those occasions where Coltrane was really on, glimpses of his future greatness are in evidence.  Meanwhile, Davis had mastered the art of finding the right note for the right time, of using the trumpet's middle range to execute beautiful lyrical emotion, and of adapting and arranging pieces to fit the band's strengths. 

If anything, his skills as a band leader were as important, if not more so, than that of a player from the time this band came together to make these great recordings.  And, it was only going to get better with the Columbia sessions, as will be covered here soon.

John Coltrane: Live at Birdland

The death of Amiri Baraka (formerly LeRoi Jones) a few days back was a good time to reflect on the remarkable and controversial ferment that erupted in the 1960s over black militancy, so-called free jazz, battles between jazz critics and writers, and a host of other issues.

Just last year, this blogger read Jones' ground-breaking and provocative work, Blues People, which was the first work by a black person to look at the history of jazz music, but also seeking to place that in the context of the history of black Americans as oppressed peoples expressing themselves through a music they created, despite all of the obstacles in their way.  This isn't a place to discuss the book, necessarily, certainly not to review it--there's plenty of material out there to search out for that.

But, whatever one thinks of the man who made a strikingly radical transformation from LeRoi Jones to Amiri Baraka in 1965, after the assassination of Malcolm X and of Medger Evers and other events, and continued to provoke and be the subject of controversy for decades afterward, this seemed a good time to commemorate the man via his contribution to the liner notes of John Coltrane's 1963 album Live at Birdland.

Which album is many things, actually, not always consistently expressed.  For example, while the first half of the record is comprised of three pieces from a performance at the famed New York club on 8 October 1963, the second portion is from three works recorded in the studio in March and November of that year.  The performance at Birdland also captured the return to the classic Coltrane quartet of drummer Elvin Jones, who had spent time in prison on a drug charge.  Finally, the album closed a chapter in Coltrane's career that was marked by critical tumult and a carefully crafted program by Coltrane's savvy producer, Bob Thiele, to blunt the criticism with a trio of recordings.

In essence, the problem was the jazz was changing from years of hard-bop orthodoxy to a freer conception as embodied in the work of Cecil Taylor, Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy, Coltrane and others.  Those critics who were aghast at the move (some of whom, in fact, championed bop when it was new in the late 1940s versus the so-called "moldy figs" who had promoted big band and swing) came out forcefully against the "free jazz" musicians. 

In Coltrane's case, he was labeled as promoting "anti-jazz" because the work he was performing in 1961 with Dolphy was a sea change from the hard bop sound that predominated before and which was featured on the Live at the Village Vanguard album and, in particular, the leader's showcase, "Chasin' the Trane," which didn't even feature Dolphy (yet, this sadly underappreciated multi-instrumentalist was put through the wringer nonetheless.)

While Coltrane claimed that the abrupt change in direction that followed 1962's excellent Coltrane recording was due to a faulty reed on his sax and teeth problems, Thiele revealed that he deliberately drew Coltrane towards ballads and more melodic music to counter the raging critics and give the saxophonist a forum for demonstrating his amazing gifts in those settings. 

What followed were collaborations with the legendary Duke Ellington, the smooth, silky singer Johnny Hartman, and an album of standards, simply called Ballads.  These albums are usually bypassed when people talk about Coltrane's body of work, but there is much to recommend them.  This is especially true when hearing how Coltrane accompanies and complements Ellington and Hartman and to hear how truly integrated that classic quartet of Jones, bassist Jimmy Garrison and pianist McCoy Tyner were.  They all proved to be tremendous with ballads and contemplative material, not just with the up-tempo and powerhouse works that the band had been singled out for by those contentious critics.

In any case, Live at Birdland marked the end of that phase, yet provided examples (as really, all Coltrane records had to date, anyway, despite the critical carping) of how the band could really cook and sizzle and then settle into beautiful melodies and mellow moods on a dime.

The record also captured the obvious joy with which Jones expressed himself after leaving federal prison and releasing his pent-up energies (energy never being a problem with the protean percussionist anyway!)  The opener, "Afro-Blue," a concert favorite for Coltrane, but never recorded in the studio, has excellent playing by the leader as well as Tyner and Garrison, but Jones is front and center here, by a country mile.  He thunders, crashes, rolls and roars through this tune like a veritable force of nature. 

While this blogger was flabbergasted by the performance and can vividly remember hearing Jones blasting through the piece when first hearing this tune on vinyl, circa 1990, and, in fact, smiling and appreciatively calling out the drummer's name through virtually the whole thing, it can be readily understood if the playing was too propulsive, too powerful and so overwhelming that it sacrificed the ensemble for the sheer joy and relief of Jones being free to play after months behind bars.

Which is all the reason to be understanding of where Jones was (which, certainly, the band and the audience were) at that moment and appreciate that the performance was, indeed, a reflection of joy and relief.  In any case, it's a wild ride, still raising hair on the back of the neck and bumps on the skin after many listens and almost a quarter century after first hearing.

Then comes "I Want to Talk About You," beautifully played by the ensemble and with Jones sensitively accompanying and not at all playing too hard.  The piece is played almost as per usual (it was another popular repertoire piece for the band) until Coltrane goes off into a phenomenal unaccompanied solo.  This solo, to this listener, is on a par with "Chasin' the Trane," but didn't have the impact and drama of having something like this done the first time, as was the case of the other work.  Still, the performance is terrific, with Coltrane exploring variation and variation and demonstrated masterful technique, invention, and soulfulness.

After these two pieces, "The Promise," another 8-minute tune, doesn't get as much attention, but the theme is excellent and there is a strong swinging accompaniment by the band behind Trane's tenor.  Tyner performs a stellar lengthy solo, anchored by his trademark strong block chords with the left hand, and Jones percolates, keeps strong time with the cymbals, and hums along enthusiastically, while increasing his intensity towards the end to drive things along.  Garrison is steady, as always, holding down the bottom with his usual aplomb.  Then, Trane comes swooping in with his top-flight solo that is thrilling with its higher-end note flourishes and runs (one can hear on this song why the soprano wound up becoming so important to Trane in terms of finding higher notes to play) and, after restating the theme, the band goes out with a flourish.

Of the two studio pieces, "Alabama" is flat-out one of Coltrane's masterpieces.  A solemn remembrance of the horrific Montgomery church bombing the claimed the lives of several young black girls who should have been safe in the sanctuary of a holy place, the piece has a rich and powerful theme, evocative of the thoughtlessness of the terrorist act performed by white supremacists, played over Tyner's simple repetitive phrase and what may be Garrison's bowing on the bass. 

Then, about 1:45 in, the piece transitions to a mid-tempo blues, almost as if suggesting the resilience that the blues has always symbolized in the lives of black Americans.  After another minute, the theme returns and Jones' mallets add weight and dignity to the sound as the tune comes to a close with the tenor taking the ending to higher scales on his instrument and ending the piece beautifully.   Coltrane would further develop the structure of "Alabama" in classic pieces in the great Crescent album and on the masterpiece A Love Supreme during 1964.  But, "Alabama" stands on its own as one of the great pieces in music, period.

"Your Lady" comes in with a nice Garrison line and Jones' always present swinging and "polyrhythms" before Trane's lyrical theme comes in, much like other, somewhat like "The Inch Worm" from the Coltrane album, at least to this listener.  The keening, soaring sound of the tenor is another excellent example of the leader's peerless playing, especially some great runs about 4 minutes in.  And, as always, Jones is there to propel the piece with his driving and penetrating style.

Finally, there is a bonus track on the CD version called "Vilia," a reworking of a standard that seems a little out of place, like "Bessie's Blues" on the otherwise meditative and somber Crescent.  It's bright and it swings, especially during Tyner's fine solo when Garrison and Jones are in a beautiful groove.  After Coltrane solos, the song seems to come to an abrupt end, for which there may have been a reason.  In any case, it's a bonus and that Tyner solo part is quite good.

As for LeRoi Jones, he starts his notes provocatively with, "One of the most baffling things about America is that despite its essentially vile profile, so much beauty continues to exist here."  Jones, as many have done, equates the nightclub as a microcosm of vileness and the playing of a master as the beauty.  And, then Jones offers that "his music is one of the reasons suicide seems so boring!"

It is cool to read Jones describing Elvin's playing as a "mad ritual drama" that taunts the other musicians, as it is that LeRoi "got up and danced while writing these notes, screaming at Elvin to cool it," a sentiment shared to some degree by this blogger, except that asking Elvin to hold back was not among the thoughts.

Jones also utters an unexpected paean to the name of the state of Alabama, observing that "I didn't realize what a beautiful word Alabama is."  Continuing that Thiele asked Coltrane if the title "had any significance to today's problems," the leader didn't address the bombings (which might, perhaps, have opened up to further critical commentary?) with directness, stating that "it represents, musically, something that I saw down there translated into music from inside me."

Finally, Jones does not that, actually, "all the music on this album is Live, whether it was recorded above drinking and talk at Birdland, [or] in the studio," which is true, except, perhaps, that the atmosphere in each are entirely different and the results could be accordingly.  But, the essayist concludes in another cool evocation:  "this music will make you think of a lot of weird and wonderful things.  You might even become one of them."

Amen to that and may LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka, for all of the controversy and the directness and the penetration and the evocation, rest in peace.  Whatever one thinks of him and this blogger is ambivalent, for sure, he encouraged honest and critical thinking and the fact that he dug Coltrane and the quartet and this album as much as he did is worth celebrating on its own terms.

John Coltrane:  Live at Birdland (Impulse Records, 1963, 1996)

1.  Afro-Blue  10:53
2.  I Want to Talk About You  8:11
3.  The Promise  8:06
4.  Alabama  5:08
5.  Your Lady  6:39
6.  Vilia  4:36

John Coltrane: Africa/Brass, Volumes 1 & 2

Obviously, Trane's Giant Steps needs to be covered here as his greatest early recording, with Blue Train not far behind, but there was something really eye-opening back in 1990 hearing the incredible tune "Africa" from the saxophonist's first Impulse! album, Africa/Brass.

It was first the amazing opening with the emulation of animal and other sounds by a host of instruments played by some of the leading lights of late 50s and early 60s jazz.  These include Booker Little, whose death of uremia at age 23 took away someone who could have been a true legend and the versatile Freddie Hubbard on trumpets; the trombonists Charles Greenlee and Julian Priester, the latter a member of Sun Ra's underappreciated band; and the man who arranged it all, the alto sax and bass clarinet master Eric Dolphy.

Beyond these excellent players, there was the phenomenal rhythm section of pianist McCoy Tyner, bassists Paul Chambers, who'd worked with Trane in the great Miles Davis Quintet, and Reggie Workman, and, of course, the sublime Elvin Jones, one of the few drummers whose power and flexibility could work so well with such a large ensemble.

Trane's solo work on "Africa" is also pretty spectacular and, along with "India," demonstrated a palpable shift in his moving away from the so-called "sheets of sound" to something more exploratory of the broader potential of sound on his instrument rather than speedy runs on the changes that characterized his work up to about 1960.  The piece was recorded on either 4 June, according to the original album notes, or the 7th, as indicated in the liners for the second volume of recordings from the sessions. 

More importantly, "Africa" and "India" were concerted efforts at delving into sounds that evoked the music of non-Western cultures, reflecting Coltrane's growing interests in African, Indian and Middle Eastern sounds.

After his great success with "My Favorite Things" the year prior, Coltrane tried other popular tunes on which to work his modal magic on soprano sax and the attempt here was with the venerable "Greensleeves."  While the recording is usually regarded as an inferior one to "MFT," this blogger finds the piece not comparable and the ensemble does a fine job with it.  "Blues Minor" is just that and it is well played.  Both were recorded on 23 May 1961, two days before Trane recorded his final album for Atlantic, Olé, which also featured Dolphy.

In 1974, with the supervision of Coltrane's widow, Alice, a second volume of recordings from the original 1961 sessions was released.  Alternate versions of "Africa" and "Greensleeves" were accompanied by another traditional tune, arranged by the leader, this being "Song of the Underground Railroad."  While the latter two were recorded on 23 May with other selections from the first recording, the version of "Africa" was from 7 June and had an expanded orchestra conducted by Dolphy and including trombonist Britt Woodman (instead of Priester); four French horn players; a euphonium; tuba player Bill Barber, who had played with Miles Davis' so-called "Birth of the Cool" project a dozen years before; and Pat Patrick on a variety of reeds.  Instead of Paul Chambers, this session featured another solid bassist, Art Davis.

While the versions of "Africa" and "Greensleeves" may not be superior to the original released versions, it is interesting to hear the difference with the additional instrumentation, while "Song of the Underground Railroad" is another solid rendering.  In all three cases, Dolphy's different approaches to orchestration are indicative of his ability to experiment successfully with unusual instrument groupings and his strong sense of dynamics.

Dolphy's association with Coltrane was highly controversial at the time, for reasons which seem petty and trivial now, but, in light of the massive changes enveloping jazz as it moved from a primarily "hard bop" sound to the freer expressions wrought by Trane, Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor, among others, there was a genuine fear that the music was being pulled into chaotic waters. 

While Dolphy continued to experiment and extend his ideas further "out," albeit with less visibility than he had with Trane, the latter, in fact, soon moved into a period of recording that seemed calculated to prove that he could play in "traditional" ways, recording with the great Duke Ellington and with smooth as silk vocalist Johnny Hartman, as well as issuing an album of ballads.  Not until 1965 did Coltrane decide to let loose the reins and move into so-called "free jazz."

Perhaps Africa/Brass could be viewed as an early effort by Trane to take the music into a transitional zone, not too far removed from either the "standard" boppish sounds of the fifties or the freer work that was to dominate the sixties.  In "Africa," he and Dolphy created a sound that was eminently successful, while the other pieces on both volumes may not be quite so because they used the orchestration as coloration, rather than as a vital and integral part of the atmosphere of the tune as in "Africa."

In any case, this recording was an unusual way for Coltrane to launch his association with the fledgling Impulse! label, which, however, got a reputation for new, innovative music.  Africa/Brass went a long way towards heightening that feeling and for helping to make the label a standard bearer for newer forms of jazz that were, more or less, defining the new decade.

Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane at Carnegie Hall

The six months that John Coltrane spent with Thelonious Monk in the latter part of 1957 has long been heralded as one of the great partnerships in jazz and for good reason.  Coltrane finally kicked a longtime heroin habit earlier in the year after being fired by Miles Davis, under whom the tenor saxophonist had gotten his first major recognition.  Monk, after years as an under-recognized innovator of the so-called "bop" movement, was also starting to get long overdue attention for his work, including the amazing 1956 record, Brilliant Corners, with the tenor giant Sonny Rollins.  When Davis fired Coltrane, Monk was quick to get the sax player to join his quartet.

For most of the last part of 1957, the quartet had a residency at the Five Spot Café and as the year closed the band's legend grew.  While Coltrane had to calibrate his staggering work ethic to the demands of playing with the highly unorthodox Monk, the rapport and effort the two put forward paid off handsomely during the engagement.  Less talked about, however, was the solid backing of bassist Ahmed Abdul-Malik and, especially, drummer Shadow Wilson.

Unfortunately, the quartet was at all well recorded--Trane made appearances on the Monk's Music  record, but it was not until 1961 that producer Orrin Keepnews cobbled together a few unreleased studio pieces from July 1957, at the beginning of Coltrane's tenure and some outtakes from the Monk's Music record along with one solo performance from the leader's Thelonious Alone album for the Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane, which was released in 1961 when Trane had become a major star.

The result was that the legend of the Monk/Coltrane outfit was one perpetuated by those who had seen the band live, particularly as the six-month residency matured and developed.  This was especially noteworthy as the studio recordings all came when Trane was still learning to play with Monk's singular style and complex arrangements.

Then, in early 2005 a stunning discovery was made at the Library of Congress and its Voice of America international radio program collection.  the LOC's recording lab supervisor Larry Appelbaum, as he explains in his short note, was "thumbing through some VOA acetate tapes awaiting digitization" when he "noticed several reels labeled 'Carnegie Hall Jazz 1957." 

There was a Thanksgiving performance on 29 November at the famed New York venue with a stunning lineup of Billie Holiday, Dizzy Gillespie, Ray Charles, Chet Baker with Zoot Sims, Sonny Rollins, and "Thelonious Monk quartet with John Coltrane."  And, one of the tape boxes, Appelbaum found, was labeled "T. Monk" and listed song titles.  As he remembered, "When we played it, I recognized both Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane and my heart started racing." 

Appelbaum had found a "holy grail" that had been searched for diligently by Coltrane biographer Lewis Porter, who contributed his own essay, as did Amiri Baraka (the former LeRoi Jones), Ira Gitler, Ashley Kahn, Stanley Crouch and Robin D. G. Kelley.  This is a formidable lineup of jazz critics and writers testifying to the importance of this astonishing discovery.

There were two shows recorded that day for broadcast on the Voice of America and the music is just spectacular.  These are fully realized versions of some of Monk's greatest compositions, from "Crepuscule with Nellie" to "Epistrophy" to "Sweet and Lovely" to "Monk's Mood."  The leader sparkles throughout with his unique way of writing, arranging, soloing and comping behind Trane, while the latter appeared totally comfortable with his surroundings and displays much of that rapid-fire, intricately developed, and carefully orchestrated soloing style that Gitler, to his regret, termed, at that time, as "sheets of sound."

Again, though, it's easy to overlook the rhythm section--guys who were not given the kind of attention provided to others of the time, but whose way of supporting Monk and Trane were perfectly suited for the tunes, the sound and the personnel.  Wilson, in particular, is fine form.

This is one of those rare recordings that matches its historical significance with peak performance.  Not long after, however, Coltrane would return to work with Miles Davis on some of that trumpeter's greatest albums, including Milestones, recorded just a few months after this performance, and 1959's Kind of Blue, just highlighted on this blog, while also moving closer to establishing himself as a major leader, beginning with Blue Train, also with Blue Note and recorded in 1957, and leading to Giant Steps in 1959 and everything that came after.

Monk and Coltrane only played together for six months, mostly unrecorded at the Five Spot residency, but this hidden gem shows just what they had accomplished towards the end of their partnership.  It is one of the high points in all of jazz, without exception.

Miles Davis: Kind of Blue

Miles Davis's landmark 1959 album Kind of Blue is so commonly cited as one of the great recordings in jazz, if not just American music generally, that there seems to be little necessary to say about it.  An entire book by Eric Nisenson has been written about it for those (moi, for example) who just had to get deeply into the background, events and personalities involved in this spectacular masterwork.

Suffice to say that the sextet of Davis, tenor sax giant John Coltrane, alto sax titan Julian "Cannonball" Adderley, pianist Bill Evans, bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Jimmy Cobb (pianist Wynton Kelly appears on the blues "Freddie Freeloader," apparently because Evans' softer approach didn't work well for that piece) melded perfectly on five sublime pieces that are all classic works, these being "So What;" "Freddie Freeloader;" "Blue in Green;" "Flamenco Sketches;" and "All Blues."

The opening track is probably the most well-known, deriving its title from one of Davis's pat phrases, but its memorable two-note horn phrase with Chambers' distinctive bass riff is one of jazz's most easily recognizable snippets.  "All Blues" is likely the piece that gets the most attention after "So What" with its catchy melodic line (again two notes from the horns with Evans' light touch on piano) being another classic phrase.

 

 

Also highly regarded is the gorgeous "Flamenco Sketches" and anyone familiar with Davis's sublime work with the great arranger Gil Evans, which dated to 1948, will know of the fantastic Sketches of Spain which the two created a couple of years after Kind of Blue. That interest in Spanish music "sketched" here developed into full flower with the later masterpiece.

 

While "Freddie Freeloader," another blues and "Blue and Green" are not as well-known, they are fine pieces that seamlessly work with the more famous tracks.  The record, then, has the "modal" element of working of a given key and a group of scales, rather than chord changes, that gives more space for soloists and develops an atmosphere and an ambience in tandem with the relaxed mid-tempo feel that permeates the record.  Simply put, the record flows effortlessly from one tune to the next.

 

Tellingly, Davis brought rough sketches of tunes to the session without the band members having heard or seen anything of them before.  This forced the group to develop its improvisatory skills and keen group dynamics to full focus in the recording.  Notably, when Coltrane began recording his famed Giant Steps album just a couple of weeks later, he employed the same strategy.

 

1959 was a year of masterpieces in the jazz world: the aforementioned Coltrane record and Ornette Coleman's mind-blowing The Shape of Jazz to Come, which was recorded a month after Kind of Blue come immediately to mind.  While those two works were considered in the so-called "avant garde," Davis's Kind of Blue was a more refined album and its popularity was such that it became the highest-selling jazz record of all time, selling a staggering 4 million copies in a genre where tens of thousands in sales is considered a success.

 

Yet, Kind of Blue also marked the end of an era for Davis and the start of new ones for three of his band members.  Coltrane soon left the group to embark on a seven-year odyssey that put him at the pinnacle of the jazz world's experimental domain.  Adderley also soon left to front his own band and became a success with the so-called "Soul Jazz."  Bill Evans, meanwhile, who had already left Davis but returned for these sessions, formed a trio with bass wizard Scott LaFaro and drummer Paul Motian (later known for his work with Keith Jarrett and his own bands) that made memorable music for two years before LaFaro's untimely death in 1961.

 

Today, Jimmy Cobb, at 84, is the sole surviving member of the seven musicians who worked on Kind of Blue and still plays, working with his "So What" band as a tribute to his work on the album and with Davis.

 

A 1997 reissue with 20-bit remastering features Evans's original liner notes about group improvisation more than the personalities or the songs as well as critic Robert Palmer interesting observations.

 

Miles Davis:  Kind of Blue (Columbia Records, 1959)

 

1.  So What  9:22

2.  Freddie Freeloader  9:46

3.  Blue in Green  5:37

4.  All Blues  11:37

5.  Flamenco Sketches  9:26

6.  Flamenco Sketches (alternate on a 1997 remastered reissue)  9:32



The Major Works of John Coltrane

Admittedly a strange title considering the great tenor saxophonist had so many other "major works," the two-disc The Major Works of John Coltrane was issued by GRP Records in 1992 with a fascinating selection of recordings made between late June and mid October 1965, when Trane pushed beyond the modal framework that yielded such classic records as A Love Supreme and Crescent and took his music into a freer, more experimental direction.

The epitome of this was the mindblowing Ascension, which was recorded in two takes on 28 June with his classic quartet of McCoy Tyner (piano), Jimmy Garrison (bass) and Elvin Jones (drums) and added seven other musicians, including tenor sax players Archie Shepp and Pharoah Sanders, altoists John Tchicai and Marion Brown, trumpeters Freddie Hubbard and Dewey Johnson and bassist Art Davis.  The first, slightly shorter at 38 1/2 minutes, version, called Edition I, was released first, before Coltrane, insisting that the other take, marked as Edition II and lasting two minutes longer, was the master and so a reissue had to be undertaken.

Clearly influenced by Ornette Coleman's 1960 epic, Free Jazz, Coltrane presented his musicians with very little in the form of a head arrangement or instruction, preferring those assembled to work together to develop the piece, although there was a preestablished order of soloists that varied between the two editions.  As Brown expressed it in a quote in the liners: "Spontaneity was the thing.  Trane had obviously thought a lot about what he wanted to do, but he wrote most of it out in the studio."  Shepp commented that "the emphasis was on textures rather than the making of an organizational unity" or, rather, that there was unity, but of the texture and sound, not the structure.

The musicians were an interesting mix, with some like Shepp, Tchicai (an Afro-Dane who was relatively new in America, but had honed his craft in his native Denmark) and Sanders representing the so-called "New Thing" of experimenting musicians working in the "free" realm, while Hubbard and Davis had a more mainstream background.  Brown and Johnson were largely unknown.  And, of course, there were the three stalwarts that had performed with Coltrane for some three years with it being notable that there was not a second drummer brought in because of Jones' remarkable polyrhythmic abilities.

Ascension proved to be an apt title as the music rose in power and intensity throughout the piece, not just for the listener, but also for the musicians, as Brown remarked that "they both [the editions] had that kind of thing in them that makes people scream.  The people who were in the studio were screaming.  I don't know how the engineers kept the screams out of the record."  Now, for some listeners not attuned to freer music, the cacophony is likely enough to send them screaming out of the room or scrambling to hit "stop" on their player.

But, for those who enjoy experimental "free jazz," this can be a profoundly moving record, both in the dense ensemble sound, but the soloing, as well.  Shepp has the coruscating earthy tone, Sanders the screaming upper-register blasting, the leader playing in all manner of sound and texture, Tyner keeping things grounded as much as possible with his somewhat out-of-place piano, Hubbard hitting the high notes with a clear-toned trumpet, and Davis and Garrison using the different bowed and plucked aspects of the double bass, while Jones tries mightily to employ all the rhythmic wizardry he can with the intensity and variety in the room.

As was noted in an earlier post about Albert Ayler's music, the best way to listen to this music may be to follow the sounds and textures Shepp emphasized, rather than to intellectualize the structure.  In this sense, Ascension can be a powerful experience.

Probably the same listening advice can be given to the 29-minute Om, although that recording, done in suburban Seattle on 1 October, and released in 1967, has been accorded far less attention than Ascension.  It is far stranger and denser than the other and was put to tape while Coltrane and his quartet were on the road with two other musicians, including Donald Garrett on the bass clarinet, although on the recording he plays the bass, and Sanders on tenor.  For the recording of Om, flutist Joe Brazil was added. 

There was a more pronounced and experiemental nod to India here than the perhaps superficial use of scalar patterns used in India in the recordings at the Village Vanguard in late 1961.   Then again, Coltrane's music was delving deeper into broad religious contexts from A Love Supreme to Meditations, which was recorded almost two months after Om.  Indeed, a vocalization appears here, as well, as the leader and others (Sanders, perhaps) recite the phrase "Om mani padme hum," a Buddhist mantra with many meanings, although the liners choose, "Om, the jewel, is in the lotus, amen." 

It should be pointed out that the term "Om" has significance to Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism, so that it is a mystical sound in each and is used before and after reciting Hindu texts.  In the Jain religion, the term refers to the five-fold hierarchy of beings, including teachers, awakened beings, and liberated souls.

Regardless of the esoteric doctrinal applications of the phrase, the music in Om is primal, with animal sounds frequently issuing forth from the instruments, powerful with an even denser, cacophonous and intense wall of sound than that found in Ascension, though some of this is attributable to the studio and engineering, as the latter was recorded in the Rudy Van Gelder studio where the epitome of engineering expertise was to be found as opposed to the more pedestrian Camelot Studio in Lynwood, Washington, where Om was recorded.

Much has also been made of the possible (or likely?) influence of LSD at the Om session and it would certainly be easy to listen to the noises pouring forth from the speaker and conclude that the use of the drug was a guide to its otherwordly sound.  There is likely no way to know whether the stories are true and it may not matter.  Om, even with Ascension as an immediate precedent, has been a source of puzzlement and even derision unlike anything else in Coltrane's catalog, but this listener finds it fascinating.

The same applies to Kulu Se Mama, which was recorded in Los Angeles just about two weeks after Om.  There, while the Coltrane band was playing at the famed It Club, the leader met Juno Lewis, who hailed from New Orleans and who composed this piece which had vocals based on a poem Lewis said was in an Afro-Creole dialect called "Entobes."  Whatever validity there is in Lewis' stated associations, his voice and playing of various African derived percussion instruments, and Garrett's more prominent use of bass clarinet add new dimensions to Coltrane's evolving sound.  Kulu Se Mama has, over its 19 minute length, moments of exoticism that make for an interesting comparison to the earlier example of Africa from Trane's first Impulse! album in 1961.

In contrast to the other recordings on this set, Selflessness has more of the "traditional" compositional elements from Coltrane's earlier work, suffused, though, with the heavier textures brought in by the additional musicians and, most notably, by Sanders' intensely personal explorations of the upper reaches of the tenor's higher register, something he would bring to the fore in Meditations and the Live in Japan recordings later.  The 15-minute piece was released originally with tracks from a 1963 Newport Jazz Festival recording and probably seemed more in-place with that live performance than with the wild, restive recordings of a far more experimental Coltrane in mid-to-late 1965.

In any case, The Major Works of John Coltrane is a title that would raise the hackles of those who can argue, with some reason, that this term applies more to A Love Supreme, Crescent, Giant Steps, Blue Trane or My Favorite Things.  But, with the powerful and transportive Ascension at the helm and some curious, but compelling, works in Om and Kulu Se Mama, it is a very interesting set, using the CD technology to advantage for its long-form works, that has been played often in the twenty years since YHB picked it up.

The Major Works of John Coltrane (Impulse! GRP, 1992)

Disc One:

1.  Ascension (Edition I)  38:37
2.  Om  28:49

Disc Two:

1.  Ascension (Edition II)  40:31
2.  Kulu Se Mama  18:57
3.  Selflessnes  15:09

For Fanatics Only? John Coltrane: The Complete 1961 Village Vanguard Recordings

Every so often, there'll be offerings under the heading "For Fanatics Only?", highlighting box sets that the casual listener or fan of a performer or group would not likely be interested in, but which a true fan-atic would probably appreciate.

The first of these covers a set that expands upon what is, after A Love Supreme my favorite John Coltrane recording.  The single album Live at the Village Vanguard, released in 1962, took three tracks from four nights of recording by notable engineer Rudy Van Gelder and became famous (or infamous) for the mind-boggling Chasin' the Trane, in which the legendary tenor and soprano saxophonist launched into a performance without a head arrangement or theme and proceeded to blow his way through nearly 16 minutes of stunning tenor sax playing, puncutated by phenomenal variations in color, tone and phrasing and presented with remarkable control.  Van Gelder remarked that he named the tune because he literally was "chasing" Coltrane with the recording equipment to capture the performance in highly challenging circumstances in a small, packed and oddly-shaped basement nightclub.

The other two tracks from the original album include the solemn and stately "Spiritual," in which Coltrane developed a theme from an old 19th-century gospel spiritual and used his soprano, as well as his tenor, to create beautiful and also heart-wrenching solos.  Trane's work is juxtaposed in interesting, if unusual ways, by the sinewy and twisting bass clarinet work of the sadly undervalued Eric Dolphy, who was making impressive and challenging music as a leader with Prestige Records (a Blue Note live album of Dolphy's has been featured on this blog already.)  Meanwhile, the standard "Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise" swings strongly, due in large measure to the stellar rhythm section of bassist Reggie Workman and drummer par excellence Elvin Jones, who works the brushes as well as anyone in jazz, and features excellent soloing from pianist McCoy Tyner.

In 1963, two more lengthy tracks formed the backbone of another album, Impressions.  The title track features the same chord sequence as the famed Miles Davis track "So What," a piece on which Coltrane performed from the popular and critcally-successful 1959 album Kind of Blue.  But, as all great artists do, Trane took the source material from a familiar environment and then transmuted it into something completely his own.  The other piece, however, is just as staggering.  "India," which in its modal form of playing, but also Trane's soprano sax playing, does evoke a broad feeling of Indian music and the musician had been listening to Indian classical music, as exemplified then by sitarist Ravi Shankar and sarod master Ali Akbar Khan (these two were also recently profiled on this blog for an album of their performances from the 1960s.)

Actually, in the early 1990s, an older woman I knew from work had heard that I'd become a Coltrane fan and, as her son worked for MCA Records, then owner of the Impulse! Records catalog, gave me two cassettes issued by MCA of highlights of Trane's Impulse work.  The tracks that drew my attention most were excerpts from A Love Supreme, the tremendous "Out of This World" from the eponymous 1962 album, "Chim Chim Cheree," from a 1965 record that features some of Trane's most powerful and impassioned soloing, "Africa" from his first Impulse album, the masterful Africa/Brass, and, finally, "India."

For the fanatics, though, 1997 brought the mother lode: the release of the 4CD box set, The Complete 1961 Village Vanguard Recordings.  Everything that had been recorded by Van Gelder on 1, 2, 3 and 5 November 1961 is here.  There are 22 tracks of 9 individual pieces, including four versions of "India" and "Spiritual", three of "Chasin' the Trane" [well, one is called "Chasin' Another Trane" and features a frequent collaborator on drums, the inimitable Roy Haynes], two of "Impressions," "Miles' Mode," "Naima," and the traditional "Greensleeves" and one each of "Softly" and "Brasilia," the latter not appearing on record until the same 1965 album that featured "Chim Chim Cheree."

Trane was in an interesting experimental mode, not just by having Dolphy appear on several tracks, especially on the first night, but also in having two bassists, Workman and Jimmy Garrison, who made his debut with Trane at this engagement and became his regular bass player for the next 5 1/2 years, an oud player named Ahmed Abdul-Malik (recall that Nubian oud master Hamza El Din has also been spotlighted on this blog) who provided an exotic coloration on India, and the oboeist Garvin Bushell, a little-remembered jazz and classical woodwind multi-instrumentalist, whose career started in the 1920s and whose work on the 2nd and 5th of November, added a deeper layer of sound and color to "India" and "Spiritual."

For a devoted follower of Coltrane, who revels in his experimentalism, drinks in the wonders of his live recordings and is an aficionado of the previously released Live at the Village Vanguard and Impressions albums, this box set is an essential purchase.  Even the several versions of key tracks reveal a variety and diversity in lineups and performance that show just how amazing Coltrane's work was developing in the early 1960s.

Despite sour reviews from some critics who labeled the music "anti-jazz" or intoned that Trane should have saved his playing for the "woodshed" [in other words, in private rather than in front of an audience], or felt that Dolphy was completely out of place with Trane, these reactionary ripostes only seem more ridiculous as time goes on.  However, in 1962, the biting remarks had an impact on readers of jazz publications and, to some extent, to the musicians, especially Trane and Dolphy, with the former expressing disbelief at how the latter, universally known as a quiet and gently personality, was being raked over the coals by so-called authorities who were, fortunately, on the wrong side of history.

Whatever "anti-jazz" was supposed to mean in the light of the advancing the music as exemplified by Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, Cecil Taylor, Charles Mingus and many others by late 1961, John Coltrane with his Africa/Brass collection and this live recording vaulted into the front ranks of any type of musician anywhere, much less jazz.  This box set is a remarkable excursion into feeling, experimentation, passion, dynamics, etc. and, though Coltrane and producer Bob Thiele soon embarked on a series of records to counter the "anti-jazz" label, including albums featuring ballads, a collaboration with Duke Ellington, and another with the incredibly smooth singer Johnny Hartman, there was no turning back ultimately. 

In a way, the path from Live at the Village Vanguard to A Love Supreme is pretty direct and it is one of many reasons why I feel this are the two strongest Coltrane recordings in terms of the impact he had on the direction of jazz music or music generally.  The 4-CD box set, with a great booklet featuring many photos, a discography and an excellent essay by Mark Wild, just gives a much deeper and intense exploration to those fanatics interested and willing in delving deeper into the wonders of John Coltrane's music in late 1961.

John Coltrane: The Complete 1961 Village Vanguard Recordings (Impulse! Records, 1997)

Disc One:

1.  India  10:20
2.  Chasin' the Trane  9:41
3.  Impressions  8:42
4.  Spiritual  12:29
5.  Miles' Mode  9:53
6.  Naima  7:33

Disc Two:

1.  Brasilia  18:35
2.  Chasin' Another Trane  15:26
3.  India  13:14
4.  Spiritual  15:03
5.  Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise  6:25

Disc Three:

1.  Chasin' the Trane  15:55
2.  Greensleeves  6:08
3.  Impressions  10:49
4.  Spiritual  13:31
5.  Naima  7:02
6.  Impressions  14:45

Disc Four:

1.  India  13:55
2.  Greensleeves  4:51
3.  Miles' Mode  15:12
4.  India  15:06
5.  Spiritual  20:29