Alice Coltrane - S/D

thx man... when I clicked on the previous NPR link it looked like it had disappeared...

here's a link to the saved from a fire devotional mix schlump mentioned

http://dublab.com/rbma-radio-saved-from-the-fire-the-ashram-tapes-of-alice-coltrane-by-frosty/

but it really just scratches the surface and lacks some of the more jaw-dropping moments from these albums IMO

lost in a turiyasangitananda k-hole rn

looks like there was a devotional-style release on warners in '76 called radha-krsna nama sankirtana

I have that on CD (on the Wounded Bird label). This guy right here. It's really good.

I adore those super obscure Alice things from the 80s, too, would love to own them! They are a real revelation.

I think the first side of that Radha-Krsna thing one is pretty great/uplifting and the second side jam is incredibly bad... easily the worst thing she ever touched, mostly because John's son is a terrible drummer! That 2xcd live thing Transfiguration is 100x better if you want to hear her wailing away endlessly like that. Her wonderful John-imitation with the electric organ is front and center in the mix and sometimes comes uncannily close to his sound.

I recently got a 1970's McCoy Tyner album (Extensions, I think) where she is prominently playing harp which I had never heard of before and that's pretty amazing stuff, too!!! Highly recommended.

beautiful, beautiful thread revive

I recently got a 1970's McCoy Tyner album (Extensions, I think) where she is prominently playing harp which I had never heard of before and that's pretty amazing stuff, too!!! Highly recommended.

This album is part of an excellent Mosaic Records 3CD set gathering Tyner's late '60s/early '70s Blue Note albums, all of which are great.

I remember before she died she had another devotional album prepped...I guess it never happened.

http://www.alicecoltrane.org/sacredlanguage.html

Looks like her website hasn't been updated in quite some time.

got my copy of divine songs yesterday, sounds great, best of the devotional works imo, glad I snagged one

Got a copy of 'Divine Songs' on vinyl...so so beautiful...anyone know if some of the songs have been edited?...

here's an important question - on Journey in Satchidananda, the track "Isis and Osiris" was recorded live at The Village Gate, New York City, on July 4, 1970. is there a recording of the full show? seems like it would be great - Sanders, Haden, Ali and Alice...

good question, it led me to this video aggregation:

http://www.desisrus.com/videofeed/PdHTytrKo1Q

live John Coltrane footage, etc.

cool!

oooooh. never thought about that before...if something was dug up, that would be rad!

yeah, sort of seems like it would have been dug up already, but who knows? July 4 1970! what a day.

Just starting in on this thread but

Eternity - i love this album. why? because she plays a Fender Rhodes. it's also a lot more rooted in blues and jazz than some of her prior albums that were all about free jazz and stravinsky. Om Supreme is such a beautiful song. (one of the only songs of hers that i know of that has lyrics in english).

Am so totally smitten with this album, and Om Supreme in particular (though surprised JasonD loved it so much as one of the tracks is a piece from The Rites Of Spring). Our baby daughter was born in distress earlier this year, and she and her mother had to stay in hospital for a week (both fine now), and each night I found both this album and Om Supreme in particular to be a real comfort. Wonderful music. (And after my daughter was able to come home, one afternoon I was holding her in our front room while the Stravinsky piece from this album was playing, and I swear she began 'air conducting' along with the music.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WY2etLKUfAs

Mmm could listen to Alice on her Fender Rhodes forever, like Pharoah Sanders I am not overly keen on the hippyish, spiritualist excess of some of her music, especially on her vocal recordings. But albums like this one and Lord Of Lords are perfection.

wow did these 80s "spiritual guide" videos get posted here?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GA5ZwS4oonQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKKInfup8Mw

lol, I'm pretty sure I posted both of those on the vaporwave thread

what an odd accent/affect she had

QUEEN

wow!

definitely an interesting person... this interview from 1970 is mostly about John (recorded on his birthday) but it is well worth a listen: https://www.cc-seas.columbia.edu/wkcr/archives/Jazz%20Archive/artist/Alice%20Coltrane

This Red Bull Music Academy piece is great. (I've been hearing for a little while about the previously unreleased music mentioned at the end of the piece. Supposedly, Ravi Coltrane wants to put it out on his own label or something, but hasn't been able to get it together yet.)

yeah i think i heard an audience tape of that at some point? definitely ambitious.
or wait maybe this is the one i was thinking of: http://www.bigozine2.com/archive/ARrarities07/ARacucla.html

what i've always wanted to hear is the complete show that "isis and osiris" came from on journey in satchidananda -- "recorded live at The Village Gate, New York City, on July 4, 1970" with charlie haden, pharoah sanders etc ... the tape must be ... somewhere!

She turns up as a very obvious (acknowledged) influence on the new Radiohead album. It occurs to me that some of her Ptah stuff could have worked as music for "Peanuts" just as well as what eventually got used. Probably my most listened to jazz person after Larry Coryell.

I think Lord of Lords is the only one of the non-chant ones I don't own & have never heard. I should pick it up some time.

I was just playing the hell out of Joe Henderson's 'Elements' with her and it's a shame that whole band never cut a record under her name. It would have been great hearing Michael White play her material.

Turiya Sings is really wonderful

Going Home off Lord of Lords is absolute classic. I generally have an aversion to spiritual jazz, but certainly not with Alice Coltrane.

Lord of Lords is really great. Her version of Stravinsky's Firebird is fantastic.

Something similar that was probably a big influence on both Alice and John C is Yusef Lateef's awesome Eastern Sounds album. I listening to it a lot recently and it has gone way up in my estimation.

have been listening*

See also side 2 of The Diverse Yusef Lateef.

Divine Songs seriously needs a good reissue doesn't it.

A quick ctrl-f on this thread indicates it's more available than I thought. Is that CD decent quality? /stevehoffman

I have the Divine Songs and Infinite Chants CDs; they're official productions, so they sound great. I don't know how good the Turiya Sings CD, which is on some German label, sounds. It's a little pricey for me to just take the chance.

I wish they'd reissue the last one, Glorious Chants.

If you like Lateef's Eastern Sounds, you should pick up 'Cry-Tender!' if you haven't already. Side 1 is the blueprint for ES, and just a great record in general.

Oh yeah! I love a lot of his 50's/60's albums including The Golden Flute and his later drift into fusion yielded some good stuff as well.

Lateef is one of those guys I've never had time to investigate 'cause he's got, like, 75 albums. If there was a box gathering up his mid-'60s to early-'70s Atlantic albums, I'd buy it in a minute, 'cause that's the stuff I'm most interested in.

Apple Music has been great in this regard. I 'spun' The Doctor Is In... And Out! the other day for the first time. It's all over the place but was pretty much a blast through and through.

Tidal (I guess that will soon be Apple Music) has a ton of his stuff as well, including The Doctor, Golden Flute, Cry Tender...

YES

http://pitchfork.com/news/72008-alice-coltrane-compilation-to-be-released-on-david-byrnes-luaka-bop/

David Byrne’s Luaka Bop label has announced a new Alice Coltrane compilation. It’s called World Spirituality Classics, Volume 1: The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda, and it’s out May 5. The record features music Coltrane made while she lived at the Sai Anantam Ashram, which she established in 1983. The songs (recorded between 1982 and 1995) had previously been available only on cassettes distributed within her spiritual community.

Luaka Bop worked with Coltrane’s children to locate the original master tapes for the tracks. Engineer Baker Bigsby (John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Sun Ra) remastered the recordings. The compilation comes with liner notes by Ashley Kahn, interviews with people close to Coltrane, and a conversation about Coltrane between Surya Botofasina (raised on Coltrane’s ashram) and Pitchfork contributor Andy Beta.

World Spirituality Classics, Volume 1: The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda:

01 Om Rama
02 Om Shanti
03 Rama Rama
04 Rama Guru
05 Hari Narayan
06 Journey to Satchidananda
07 Er Ra
08 Keshnava Murahara
09 Krisha Japaye *
10 Rama Katha *

*vinyl only

this is very timely. i've been listening to her ashram tapes nonstop recently, via an incomplete set of youtube clips. it's too bad they're not re-releasing the albums (4, i think?) in full, but having at least some of it on vinyl will be a real treat. i can't wait.

OMG, that's amazing news. I wasn't even aware of that material but I love Alice Coltrane so much.

there was discussion about it on another alice thread recently (can't find it, RIP search), but this is a good place to start: http://dublab.com/rbma-radio-saved-from-the-fire-the-ashram-tapes-of-alice-coltrane-by-frosty/

breaking that down in terms of tracks per album:

Turiya Sings: Rama Katha

Divine Songs: Om Shanti, Rama Guru, Rama Rama, Hari Narayan, Er Ra, Keshava Murahara

Infinite Chants: Om Rama, maybe a different Rama Guru, Krishna Japaye

Glorious Chants: Journey To Satchidananda

so a pretty good overview, this is cool

Two of the albums - Divine Songs and Infinite Chants - are still available on CD, I think; I bought my copies from her ashram bookstore a few years ago. Turiya Sings was reissued on CD by a European label, Be Jazz, in 2015, but I think it was a boot 'cause you can't find copies anywhere anymore and Discogs won't let people sell it there. Glorious Chants was only ever released on CD, way back in 1990, and has never been reissued.

Since I already have the bulk of this material, I probably don't need the compilation, but I am kinda pissed that two of the tracks are vinyl-only.

this is a good place to start: http://dublab.com/rbma-radio-saved-from-the-fire-the-ashram-tapes-of-alice-coltrane-by-frosty/

i should mention that i like that for the writing, not so much for the mix that's included. the mix is good, but tbh i prefer to just put all of this on:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhdQEXlQmpI

this is challopsy but i think it might be my favorite alice coltrane album.music doesn't do this to me frequently, to this degree, but it really transports me.

i've never ventured beyond those three impulse albums - monastic trio, ptah el daoud, and journey. journey i first heard when i was about 14 or 15 from my older brother and it's been one of my favorite albums since then. what would be good to go to next?