Alice Coltrane featuring Pharoah Sanders - Journey in Satchidananda (2024 Impulse! Stereo Gatefold LP)

Alice Coltrane featuring Pharoah Sanders - Journey in Satchidananda | Vinyl LP - 2024 Impulse!/Verve Stereo Gatefold Reissue (B0036675-01/AS-9203)

Alice Coltrane had been a disciple of Swami Satchidananda since the late 1960s. The swami had been a presence in the Coltrane household during John Coltrane's final years, and Alice's spiritual practice deepened after John's death in 1967. By November 1970, when she recorded the four studio tracks that fill most of this album, her music had moved into territory where jazz improvisation and devotional practice were no longer separable.

The studio ensemble included Pharoah Sanders on soprano saxophone and percussion, Cecil McBee on bass, Rashied Ali on drums, Tulsi on tambura and Majid Shabazz on bells and tambourine. Tulsi's tambura drone is the thread that connects every studio track. It appears underneath the opening bass vamp of the title piece and remains audible throughout, giving the harmonic movement a fixed point to return to. The title track builds slowly from McBee's repeating figure through Sanders's soprano and Coltrane's harp and piano, the melody suspended rather than resolved. "Shiva-Loka" follows a similar approach. "Stopover Bombay" is the shortest piece at under three minutes, Coltrane on piano. "Something About John Coltrane" is the most emotionally direct track, Coltrane playing piano in a register closer to gospel than to Indian classical music, the composition acknowledging her late husband without attempting to imitate his sound.

"Isis and Osiris" closes the album. It was recorded four months before the studio tracks, live at the Village Gate on July 4, 1970, with a different ensemble: Charlie Haden replaces McBee on bass, Vishnu Wood plays oud, and Coltrane plays harp only. Sanders's soprano and Ali's brushwork float above the harp and oud for eleven and a half minutes.

This is a c.2024 Impulse!/Verve gatefold reissue.