ALICE COLTRANE / “Isis And Osiris”

I repeat myself this week. Alice Coltrane. Journey In Satchindanada. Get to this. Elevate yourself.

Mtume said he wanted more Alice Coltrane. I knew something was wrong. Or should I say, I knew something was right?

He wanted more of the classic selections, not the way-out piece. I hesitated. He pressed his case. I said it would just be more of the same. He said, more of the same would be great.

Alice Coltrane is great.
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She is truly a mystic. Truly someone who was concerned with enlightenment, how to help the whole world be a better and more beautiful place.

In Alice Coltrane's music you hear loving dedication to living a meaningful life. Her music is not merely an extension of John Coltrane music. Alice Coltrane has recorded a body of work manifesting unique vibrations. From the funky to the sublime, Alice embraces all the elements.

She is a lens focusing the best of our yearnings on the possibilities and potentials within us to be divine-like, god-like, truly human. Rather than slide downward toward base instincts and ego-driven behavior, Alice travels upward and inward, using consciously created sounds to help and encourage all who hear her.

Spirit-escalator music. Sounds that will take you up into the higher reaches of yourself. These are not blowing tunes in the typical sense of twentieth century jazz, but rather sonic explorations, music philosophy on the big questions of life: What is life? What am I here for? How should I govern myself? How should I relate to others?
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If you sit down and listen to this music with your eyes closed, unavoidably, one of three things will happen. 1. You will become bored and look for something else. 2. You will fall asleep. 3. You will begin to meditate on your life.

From the opening harp solo of “Wisdom Eye” taken from Alice’s Eternity album, to Satchindanada's superb and sublime “Isis and Osiris” (featuring ethereal soprano work from Pharoah Sanders), followed by the classical influenced “Radhe-Shyam” selected from the beautiful album Transcendence, to the Hindu/gospel of "Bhaja Govindam" (also from Transcendence) and the piano solo of “One For The Father” taken from the concert release Transfiguration—this is all God-centered music, the reach for perfection, spirit stretches beyond wherever our flesh inhabits.

The selections close out with “Fire,” an improvised track from The Elements, an album under the leadership of saxophonist Joe Henderson. Here you hear a more earth-borne Alice Coltrane. A dancing Alice Coltrane. A reminder that she acknowledged the flesh part of herself. Obviously her feet did not fail her. She could do funky.

I feel it is unnecessary to give further descriptions of this music because once you experience her joyful deity-vibrations, if Alice’s music pierces your consciousness then you will have a clarity and enjoyment that no words of mine, or anyone else’s, can possibly match. You will have the smile of the soul uplifted.

I am a pagan. I do not follow any organized religion. Music is my religion. And I am laying before you selections from the gospel, the good sounds, of Alice Coltrane—may the universe be pleased with her contributions.

—Kalamu ya Salaam

 

         I did have to insist       

What Kalamu says above is true: I did have to insist to get him to do a redux on Alice Coltrane. As I said last week, I was both surprised and delighted by how good Alice's music is. I wanted to know if that was all there was—meaning, I wanted to know if Kalamu cherry-picked the best of Alice's records, giving us the only stuff that was worth hearing. Well, did he?

If you can't answer that question, you must not be listening. "Isis And Osiris" is as pretty a jazz record as I've ever heard. Alice's harp, Pharoah's tenor, the drummer's cymbal work (I don't know who the drummer is) [Mtume, Pharoah is playing a soprano saxophone on that cut and the drummer is Rashied Ali]—all of it is so gentle, almost fragile-sounding, yet no less powerful for its softness. And don't miss the little piece of funk they put in there. It's about seven minutes in, while Pharoah is playing, Alice and the drummer start doing a little back-and-forth thing that'll have you nodding your head to their groove...this right in the middle of an extended meditative piece.

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There was one other thing I wanted to mention. It occurs to me that, along with the reasons Kalamu stated last week, another reason Alice Coltrane wasn't better known by the masses is she probably wasn't willing to go through what artists are required to go through in order to get that mass noteriety. Can you imagine a record label approaching this woman talking about doing promotions and going say 'hi' at radio stations? I can't either. I don't say that to imply that she seems like a harsh or antisocial individual. She just seems like the kind of person who wasn't interesting in pettiness. It seems like she was all about her spirituality and her music. Period.

And speaking of the music, "Wisdom Eye," with its washes of keyboard sounds is another wonderful piece. "Bhaja Govindam" is like "Ghana Nila" from last week. It's sounds taken from the intersection of Funky Blues Ave. and Hindu Mysticism Blvd. (Not that I knew those two streets even had an intersection.) "Radhe-Shyam," the tune with the harp and the classical-sounding strings, is another keeper. So quiet and gentle, yet so full of spirit! In fact, that's a consistent theme of all of these tunes (from last week and this week)—all of them are very powerful, but in an unexpected, unlikely manner. So often, we equate power and strength with volume and size, but Alice's music derives its power from its smallness, its gentleness. She persuades through calm insistence rather than virtuostic gymnastics. I could go on and on, but, like Kalamu said, I don't think I have to. This is music that you either get or don't get. And if you do get it, well, you're probably thanking goodness that you came across these sounds. This is absolutely beautiful music.

—Mtume ya Salaam



This entry was posted on Sunday, January 28th, 2007 at 12:52 am and is filed under Classic. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.


5 Responses to “ALICE COLTRANE / “Isis And Osiris””

rylan Says:
January 28th, 2007 at 1:39 am

yes! a stunning collection … this is an incredible find … like mtume … i just had no idea that such a jazz / blues take on eastern mysticism existed … many thanks for the inspiration and connection …. feeling it!


Rudolph Lewis Says:
January 29th, 2007 at 12:31 am

It would be nice to have something by Andy Bey. What a voice! — Rudy


Greg Says:
January 29th, 2007 at 10:48 am

Thanks for more!


DeoCLIciano Okssipin Vieira Says:
January 30th, 2007 at 6:46 am

[URL=http://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/21810]Click here[/URL] for a WFMU.ORG page to hear from Huntington Ashram Monastery and more from Alice Coltrane.

Alice Coltrane — harp, piano
Ron Carter — bass
Rashied Ali — drums

That radio is awesome.
For those who are new-bees.


splanky Says:
March 24th, 2007 at 9:36 am

I have a lot of Alice’s work including this one and I don’t think she ever recorded I didn’t want to own. She was one of a kind and I miss her dearly.


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