john and alice coltrane (after interstellar space day)
yesterday was the anniversary of 'interstellar space (john coltrane thins the band down to just him and rashied ali in 1967).
the 1967 recording of john, alice, rashied ali and jimmy garrison playing some of these tunes in a full band set-up (as stellar regions) surfaces decades later (1994). the song titles are by alice - stellar regions itself is an early version of venus from interstellar space (released 1974).
after john coltrane's death alice goes on to reformulate this music in a new way in her mixing and playing on the posthumous releases and in her playing on her own solo material.
the early piano stuff (backing john coltrane) he finds less impressive - but when she gets to mix his final recordings (cosmic music, infinity etc.) her voice within it becomes clearer and then, as band leader, she manages (together with pharoah sanders) to create a deeply soulful, and yet world music-y and cosmic music. she pushes the boundaries of the instruments she takes up - the harp, the wurlitzer organ, the synthesizer, (and the instruments she brings into her ensemble, the tambura, the oud), she pushes the boundaries of the music (turning gospel into bhajans and vice versa, forming a new variety of worship music).
once again there is a second act to this life.
later there's a slight john fahey/ alice coltrane crossover - they are both booked to play a birthday gig for swami satchidananda. fahey is hanging around that scene in the mountains of lake county, northern california. fahey's most expansive music comes from this period from fare forward voyagers (soldier's choice) from 1973. - he pushes his music out onto a wider canvas reworking many of his earlier themes. the titles all come from t.s.eliot's the four quartets.
'we’re all orientophiles' said fahey of the american primitive guitarists.
there are early fahey experiments with indian instrumentation (with al wilson for example), there is his lifting of ravi shankar's improvisation on a theme from pather panchali. there is (of course) a history to be written of the diffusion of indian musical ideas into american music.
when fahey subsequently worked with bigger ensembles (the john fahey orchestras) on after the ball, old fashioned love, of rivers and religion he did not blast off for outer space, the results are more of dive into early jazz.
yesterday (a brief) meeting of the communal endeavour. a chat with enza. a bag of chips on the way home.
tomorrow horsemouth continues the fahey week celebrations. at some point he's got to get in some thoughts about harry everett smith (and other rogue anthropologists).
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