Sun Ra in Chronological Order: An Arkestra Listening Thread + Related Solar Sounds

my apologies, that's not the Bandcamp link and you can't stream it

https://sunrastrut.bandcamp.com/album/cosmo-earth-fantasy-sub-underground-vol-1-2

here's the Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psvO0AIF3iA

whoa, intense one

this is awesome.

this is one of the ones i heard about but never managed to track down back in the day... eventually art yard put out "i roam the cosmos" and i sort of gave up. glad it's findable now, this is indeed an awesome and powerful variation on "space is the place".

1976 - Live At Montreaux

https://img.discogs.com/pThuKb8K9EtlI_A2PPll56BXtjE=/fit-in/600x600/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-609984-1229180364.jpeg.jpg

https://www.discogs.com/Sun-Ra-His-Arkestra-Live-At-Montreux/master/319222

Szwed:

“In the summer of 1976 the Arkestra began their fourth tour of Europe with twenty-eight people and ended with fourteen, playing all the major festivals, Paris, Montreux (where they recorded Live at Montreux), Pescara, Nimes, Northsea, Juan-les-Pins, and Arles, and were greeted everywhere as celebrities. Yet once they returned home to Philadelphia, they still sank back into semiobscurity, the band playing down the block at the Red Carpet Lounge to a neighborhood audience of twenty, or at outdoor free concerts in the parks of North Philadelphia, to which sometimes no one came (p.341).

We now enter the brief “Inner City” era, a US label that released the studio LP Cosmos in 1976, and later reissued this LP in 1978. This 1975-76 era is the most under-documented period we’ve seen since the late 50’s, only a handful of releases over the two years. Then things explode again in ’77, but we have one more to go.

Sun Ra Sundays:

“While very little documentation survives of this tour, Live At Montreux was to become a watershed album for Ra. Recorded for a state television broadcast at the legendary Swiss jazz festival on July 9, 1976, it was first issued as a two-LP set as Saturn MS87976 and reissued by Inner City as IC1039 in 1978 (Campbell & Trent, pp.222-224). Live At Montreux would be one the few Sun Ra records to be widely available in the late-1970s and early-1980s and it was, for many people my age, their first (and perhaps only) exposure to his music. But what a great record it is! Ra was provided a decent piano and he makes good use of it (along with his battery of electronic keyboards), guiding the Arkestra through a remarkably inventive setlist. The enormous band includes many returning alumnus, including Pat Patrick on baritone sax and flute, Chris Capers on trumpet and Craig Harris on trombone, and their performance is uniformly first rate. Moreover, the sound quality is excellent—a blessed relief after all the grungy bootlegs we’ve been listening to lately. In fact, it might be one of the best-sounding releases in Ra’s enormous discography. In many ways, Live At Montreux is the definitive Sun Ra album.”

Unfortunately, this one isn’t on Bandcamp/Spotify, but there are some scattered Youtube links to parts of it:

https://www.google.com/search?q=sun+ra+live+at+montreux+1976

Dig this A+ version of ‘Take The A-Train” which I believe La Lechera used in her music class!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k341z3dsXy4

Sorry for the short week, will try to post more next week.

oh FFS I didn't fix my title typo, yes it is "Montreux"

here's a familiar release !

v happy to re-visit this today

huh, i never noticed before that sunny calls ellington the composer of "take the a train"! well he was always more into fletch...

on side 4 now, I have a US Inner City 2LP that survived an initial (ill-advised) purge of my Sun Ra section and has been in my stacks for decades now. yeah, this one has it all.

1976 - Cosmos

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1518380454_10.jpg

Originally released on the French Cobra label, the following year on Inner City in the US, and then on a series of ill-fated reissues with screwed up sound, some bootlegs, and finally a real Bandcamp remaster in 2016.

From Sun Ra Sundays:

While on their fourth tour of Europe in August 1976, the Arkestra (a portion of it, anyway) entered Studio Hautefeuille in Paris to record an album for the French Cobra label, which released later in the year as Cosmos (COB 37001).

Some notes from the Bandcamp remaster:

Each time it resurfaced, the audio quality changed, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. On the 1991 CD, the bass was mixed at woofer-quaking levels; the Inner City LP sounds flat.

The presence of the ROCKSICHORD—a slightly cheesy electronic harpsichord popular in the late 1960s with psychedelic bands and some avant-garde composers—links Cosmos with Ra's 1970 album NIGHT OF THE PURPLE MOON. Though six years apart, they are in some ways companion albums (and in some ways, not). Like Purple Moon, Cosmos features a more accessible side of Ra, a mix of relatively earthbound ensemble jazz and pan-galactic excursions.

This one is totally new to me but I am way down for a new studio session, time to cue it up.

oh see also this intriguing quote from SRS:

But as great as the band sounds on this date, it is Ra’s electric keyboard that makes this such a delightfully engaging record for me. Throughout the album, Ra’s Rocksichord has this weird, wire-thin, reedy sound quality, upon which he pours some molasses-thick phase-shifter that hisses away incessantly in the background. Now, in anyone else’s hands, this would be unbelievably cheesy, even amateurish. Yet Ra guilelessly tackles the wide variety material and, through his visionary technical abilities, miraculously balances the seemingly limited electronic keyboard textures with the expansive, acoustic Arkestra to create a decidedly strange, but appropriately otherworldly ambience.

i love the label design on the original french release:

https://img.discogs.com/1txp9NJicoFUJccvWHvGZqLmWNg=/fit-in/600x600/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-1067705-1193094726.jpeg.jpg

i was initially relieved to hear how crisp the sound was and, like you, was looking forward to a studio session, but i just hate the way the electric bass sounds on this, especially when it's doing the more conventional walking lines on the more straightforward big band arrangements. it's a shame because the horn arrangements are great and the soloists are killing it. it's WAY cheesier than the rocksichord, which i actually think sounds really good. so in that regard SRS otm. bass sounds nice on "interstellar low ways" tho.

"moonship journey" refrain is going to loop in my head for the rest of my life

early 1977 - A Quiet Place In The Universe

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Released on CD by Leo Records in 1994. “Later Campbell-Trent discography (The Earthly Recordings of Sun Ra, 2nd edition, pp. 235) suggests early 1977 and add an unidentified female vocal.”

The first of ELEVEN releases recorded this year, an embarrassment of riches. Not on Bandcamp or Spotify but we got a Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drs11_p7Pdw

SRS: “As befitting the title, A Quiet Place In The Universe is a somewhat subdued affair lacking any wild, skronky improvisations, rip-snorting big-band numbers—or even a single Gilmore solo. Nevertheless, it is a uniquely satisfying album with the title track worth the price of admission for its rarity alone. It also helps that the sound quality is excellent throughout. Leo CDs can be a little hit-or-miss, but this one is a keeper.”

Totally unfamiliar with this one, so just gonna dive in.

i feel like i need to find a quiet place in the universe right now, so this is perfect timing. thank you sleeve.

<3 love u Kate

i really enjoyed this

I got a little overwhelmed by the volume of stuff over the next few years, but I'm gearing up for this again. How's everyone doing? Any thoughts on the 70s so far?

heyooo

maybe i can find time in the next few days to do a refresher course of what we've covered so far, starting in 1970.

stoked to continue on at whatever pace feels good for you, sleeve

heh there’s actually been one late 70s album I’ve been waiting for you to get to, don’t know how renowned it is, I probably just like it because it’s gentle

well, not gentle, exactly, just... light?

1977 - Solo Piano Venice

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a0751819819_10.jpg

As far as I can tell, Ra was in Europe during the early part of this year. Following on from the previous “A Quiet Place In The Universe”, here we have the first of numerous solo piano gigs that come up over the next few years.

I think the only other solo piano we’ve heard up to this point is Monorails & Satellites? Anyway, this was released via Bandcamp back in 2015, no physical release.

https://sunramusic.bandcamp.com/album/solo-piano-venice-1977

I stand corrected, this was released on CD and LP:

https://www.discogs.com/Sun-Ra-Piano-Recital-Teatro-La-Fenice-Venezia/master/313256

From the liner notes to a *different* 1977 solo piano release:

For a few years, beginning around 1977, Ra revisited the piano as a solo vehicle. He recorded two albums for the Improvising Artists Inc. label, as well as one, "Aurora Borealis," for his own Saturn label (recorded 1980, issued 1981). He also recorded a solo piano set in Venice in '77; it was posthumously released on CD (and is available digitally in our catalog).

ive got those two improvising artists LPs, i like them a lot. its fun to hear him in that intimate mode, just him and the keys

i thought this was nice. a nice space to be in, intimate for sure.

sleeve, thanks for starting this back up and for persisting through the overwhelming amount of material and discographical info. as always, feel free to get at me if you need help or feel like taking a hiatus !

1977 - In Some Far Place (Roma 1977)

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Recorded in Italy, but not released until 2016 on Modern Harmonic.

From Discogs:

Lovely live show from Sun Ra that was probably shelfed (sic) for years because Sun Ra's piano was recorded too high resulting in slight distortion. This is at its worst during the first couple of tracks but gets better as the show progresses. Despite its limitations it's nice to have this document that stretches over two records. Sun Ra is joined only by drummer Luqman Ali with the occasional vocals from Thomas Thaddeus.

Sadly this isn’t on Bandcamp or Youtube, but I did add it to the Spotify playlist.

5/20/77 - Solo Piano, Vol. 1

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a2064659379_10.jpg

"Solo Piano, Vol. 1," the first of Ra's two albums for IAI, features four originals, a Jerome Kern standard, and Ra's arrangement of the traditional "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child." The album was issued on LP in the US in 1977, and on CD in Italy (1992) and Japan (2004). A live set—"Volume 2" of the IAI two-album deal—was recorded in 1977 at the New York venue Axis-in-Soho and issued the following year under the title "St. Louis Blues." The Axis performance was filmed and later issued for the home video market.

https://www.discogs.com/Sun-Ra-Solo-Piano-Volume-1/master/222835

https://sunramusic.bandcamp.com/album/solo-piano-vol-1

This one isn’t on Spotify, though.

7/3/77 St. Louis Blues

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1674820238_16.jpg

The 3rd solo piano release in 1977 alone, the second on the IAI label. The official Bandcamp has some serious revisionism going on:

"St. Louis Blues," was recorded live at the Axis-in-Soho venue in July 1977. It was issued on LP in 1978, and on CD in Italy (1992) and Japan (2004). The album presents four original works and Ra's interpretations of three Tin Pan Alley standards.

In 1996 IAI issued a videotape (VHS format) of the concert, which had been recorded live with multiple cameras. During the performance, the camera stream with applied video synthesis was projected for viewing by the club audience. On the VHS edition, the opening album track, "Ohosnisixaeht," was replaced with a live rendition of "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child."

For this Bandcamp-only digital release, audience response has been omitted before and after each track. All you will hear is the music performed by Sun Ra, none of which has been edited or processed in any way. If you prefer to hear the recordings in the original concert context, with applause, hooting, whistling, and exclamations, they can be heard on the LP and CD editions, as well as on digital editions at other platforms. We feel these audio artifacts intrude on intimate listening to Sun Ra's rhapsodic keyboard meditations. In addition, the digital album cover for this Bandcamp-only release differs from the original release, featuring an adaptation of the back cover of the original LP and CD. We opted to distinguish this modified music-only edition from the original version which contains audience response.

https://sunramusic.bandcamp.com/album/st-louis-blues

https://www.discogs.com/Sun-Ra-St-Louis-Blues-Solo-Piano/master/284136

(also not on Spotify, like the other IAI album)

i used to have vol. 1 on LP, not sure what happened to it.

just moved so haven't had a chance to check in, but looking forward to playing these in my new space

7/8/77 Solo Piano At WKCR

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1356730229_10.jpg

How about another one?

This set of Sun Ra solo piano works was performed and broadcast at WKCR Radio, on July 8, 1977. WKCR, the largely student-run station of Columbia University, has a decades-long tradition of fine jazz programming. During Sun Ra's career, he made so many appearances at the station that he probably had a front door key. Sometimes he performed (with or without members of the Arkestra), other times he would present rare and unreleased recordings. This solo piano set was rebroadcast several times over the years, and is documented in The Earthly Recordings of Sun Ra (Robert L. Campbell and Christopher Trent, 2nd ed., 2000), entry #252. ]

https://sunramusic.bandcamp.com/album/solo-piano-at-wkcr-1977

No physical release, added to Spotify.

for the rest of the year, we are going to return to our "regular" Saturn fare, FYI

i now have my “earthly recordings” and the szwed book out next to the stereo ... transmitting remotely but will check in via laptop tomorrow !!!

7/18/77 Somewhere Over The Rainbow

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https://img.discogs.com/flTC8au2IWVkk1Lwp3mo3jXKwTw=/fit-in/600x581/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-2132722-1464448897-8355.jpeg.jpg

https://img.discogs.com/Bh2UNHeHuZKhh3jW-Rur7e9MRz8=/fit-in/600x800/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-11535941-1518083670-5368.jpeg.jpg

(sleeve’s ears prick up)

We are now getting to the era of “Saturn LPs that have yet to be reissued” - not this one, but soon. Recorded in my former college town of Bloomington Indiana, at a well-known local nightclub that I spent many a beer-soaked night in during my post-college youth in the 80’s.

Originally released as a Saturn LP in 1977, and only reissued digitally in 2018, like a lot of the ones we’ve seen so far.

https://sunramusic.bandcamp.com/album/somewhere-over-the-rainbow

Sun Ra Sundays has a good writeup, as does the Bandcamp page (seriously, check the link above for a great piece by Brother Cleve).

Obviously, this album was quickly assembled to be sold off the bandstand while on the road, so it’s not surprising to find it kind of a mixed bag. But despite some ham-fisted editing, the sound quality is very nice (as was usually the case when Tommy Hunter was involved) and there is plenty of interesting and unique music to be found here. It may be a minor Sun Ra album in the grand scheme of things but Somewhere Over the Rainbow is imminently enjoyable. If the original tapes of this concert still exist, an expanded reissue could be something special indeed. Well, obsessives like me can dream, can't we?

Only tangentially related, but here’s a cool interview footnote I found about a jazz guy who reminisces years later about playing with Sun Ra in 1958 for his *ONLY* Indianapolis performance, an hour north of Bloomington.

https://nuvo.newsnirvana.com/music/afrofuturist-and-jazz-pioneer-sun-ra-s-legendary-indianapolis-concert/article_f8fa5a02-2d3e-11e8-8168-bb3534423523.html

this was a fun listen, a loose and relaxed show

by the way, for anyone with deep pockets, there is an insane eBay auction of Sun Ra originals going on:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/m.html?item=324285488046&_ssn=mourning_warbler&_sop=1&_ipg=100&rt=nc

Also like the Sun Ra piano and Walt Dickerson vibes album.
As TylerW says on Twitter, "Wild Sun Ra auction going down just now." I've got some of this, maybe you do too---looks like prices have gone up--also several items I've never even heard of, naturally:
https://www.ebay.com/sch/m.html?item=324285488046&_ssn=mourning_warbler&_sop=1&_ipg=100&rt=nc&fbclid=IwAR30I7OI_LVusIYH-I6tO76_4blBBoqr_093H9XS6spOx4_ndy5G5PbOQtk

Sorry sleeve! Posted without looking first! But yeah dig Sun-Walt.

Visions, that is. Workingmen's holiday, Sun Ra in shore leave attire:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visions_(Sun_Ra_album)

10/14/77 - My Favorite Things/Some Blues But Not The Kind That’s Blue

https://img.discogs.com/6vk4tZkZGlpJ6B8zcGWZFAu_Gkg=/fit-in/500x495/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-2413746-1282735130.jpeg.jpg

https://img.discogs.com/UDizdnZhGV6fWNNnPRHeG7ZacEI=/fit-in/600x600/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-14832324-1582459927-8207.jpeg.jpg

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3000359487_10.jpg

Originally released in 1977 on Saturn, then on CD with the new title by Atavistic in 2008, and finally as a Bandcamp reissue in 2015.

Sun Ra Sundays:
On October 14, 1977 the Arkestra entered Variety Recording Studio for their first studio recordings in over two years. With their increasingly busy touring schedule and tenuous finances, most Saturn records from here on out would be made live rather than in a studio—not even one as low-budget as Variety. These sessions yielded the obscure LP, Some Blues But Not The Kind That’s Blue, released on the Chicago Saturn label as LP 101477 in 1978. Alternative titles include My Favorite Things and Nature Boy and may display alternate serial numbers, LP 1014077 and 747 (see Campbell & Trent pp.241-242 for the gory details). In any event, this is one of rarest of rare Saturn LPs, with very few copies known to exist.

From the Bandcamp notes:
Some Blues But Not the Kind That's Blue is a Sun Ra rarity: an album recorded at a single session, with the location, date and personnel generally agreed upon by historians. It was also a fairly cohesive album, featuring small units of the larger Arkestra playing idiosyncratic arrangements of Tin Pan Alley standards. This is largely an acoustic piano album, with Sun Ra's keyboard in prominent focus, the horns and percussion serving primarily in support roles with occasional solos. There is no bass except on the opening title track, which was the only Sun Ra original to appear on the 1978 Saturn LP edition. An unreleased, untitled session outtake, a free-form collective improv, was first included as a bonus track on a posthumous CD reissue; it appears on this 2015 remastered edition with an assigned title. (more on that later)

Confusingly, the Atavistic CD adds two bonus tracks from 1973, but they are not the same as the Bandcamp track, and not included on that release. The Sun Ra Sundays guy (and Christopher Trent) also insist that one of the original tracks (the title track) is live, not studio.

The Bandcamp bonus track has even less clarity regarding provenance:

The title of the bonus track was assigned by Michael D. Anderson (of the Sun Ra Music Archive), who played with the Arkestra sporadically during this period, and identified the piece as a developmental version of "Outer Reach Intense Energy." The title doesn't reappear in the Ra catalog until 1985, when a radically different arrangement turns up on a collection of live tracks called Stars That Shine Darkly Vol. 2. However, the provenance of those recordings is conjectural, with a strong likelihood they were made between 1975 and 1978, around the time that Some Blues was recorded.

Listening now, I dig it.

https://sunramusic.bandcamp.com/album/some-blues-but-not-the-kind-thats-blue

https://www.discogs.com/Sun-Ra-His-Arkestra-Some-Blues-But-Not-The-Kind-Thats-Blue/master/278043

OK this 10-minute "My Favorite Things" is fantastic

10/24/77 Unity

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Happy Friday! This actually just got reissued on Bandcamp yesterday, so I thought it was particularly serendipitous that it was the next one in our journey.

Recorded live in Stonybrook, NY, and released on the Italian label Horo in 1978 as a double LP. Recently also bootlegged on the shitty B13 label. Prices are pretty insane on Discogs (starting at $95!!), I’m glad this was reissued. Sun Ra Sundays notes in 2013:

While there are no outrageous, improvised freak-outs, mad-scientist keyboard experiments (nor tediously overlong percussion jams and space chants), Unity is a classic Sun Ra record—and home to some of Gilmore’s finest playing ever committed to vinyl. Despite the rough and ready sound quality, the accessible repertoire and stellar performances makes this another ideal introduction to Sun Ra’s music for the newcomer. Too bad it’s so hard to find.

This looks like a lot of fun, some old standards in the setlist. Join me in listening!

cool !!

yep, this one is a blast

this was fun, even if it felt at times like chintzy '70s roller rink music / wacky blooper reel soundtrack. sort of jubilant throughout, with shades of ellington. not something i'm likely to return to, but it's nice to confirm that the sun ra bandcamp folks lurk here, even if they won't admit it !!

November 1977 - The Soul Vibrations Of Man

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a2617198911_16.jpg

“The Soul Vibrations of Man and a companion LP, Taking a Chance on Chances (or "… on Chancey"?), were pressed shortly after being recorded at a November 1977 gig at Chicago's Jazz Showcase. […] It's a typically eclectic set: loose improv, coalescing flutes, insistent horns, and restless percussion, amid space chants, cosmic sermons, and ballads.”

Bandcamp link

Revive! This pair of LPs closes out the year 1977, There are cheap Scorpio vinyl presses of at least one of these but as always the Bandcamp versions are definitive.

I have not actually listened to this one yet, but it felt like a good time to revive.

"If Unity presents the more approachable, trad-jazz side of Sun Ra and his Arkestra, the next item in the discography shows they were still capable of getting mighty strange during this period"

https://nuvoid.blogspot.com/2013/03/sun-ra-sunday_31.html

Good one, thanx. For last year's blog roundup, beyond constraints of some ballots (which I did send in), this 'un made my Real Top list (of first time releases and reissues):
Sun Ra & His Arkestra: Somewhere Over The Rainbow (Beyond Saturn)
And these made More Top Reissues:
Sun Ra & His Arkestra,Lanquidity (2-CD Ed.)
Sun Ra & His Arkestra, Sleeping Beauty (Expanded)
Comments:

Sun Ra & His Arkestra's Somewhere Over The Rainbow (Beyond Saturn) is mah ideel, at least in 2021, combo of SRA exotica, relatively other originals, and respectfully recharged covers, though Sleeping Beauty (Expanded Edition)comes close, while lingering too wispy w the exotica for my tastes. Despite its title, this 2-CD version ofLanquidity is not so languid, more of a sly, lean grid excursion, bra hook braille, that electric Miles might approve, or should.
https://sunramusic.bandcamp.com/album/somewhere-over-the-rainbow-beyond-saturn Also see bandcamp for my other picks, and several more from over the years and sources.

we're gonna be getting into all of those soon! part of the very productive and creatively amazing 1978-1979 period