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Ascension (John Coltrane Album)
''Ascension'' is a jazz album by John Coltrane recorded in June 1965 and released in 1966. It is considered a watershed in Coltrane's work, with the albums recorded before it being more conventional in structure and the albums recorded after it being looser, free jazz inspired works. In addition, it signaled Coltrane's interest in moving away from the quartet format. AllMusic called it "the single recording that placed John Coltrane firmly into the avant-garde". Background At the time of the ''Ascension'' recording session, Coltrane was one of the world's most successful jazz artists in both the artistic and commercial sense. His best-selling album ''A Love Supreme'' was nominated for a Grammy Award, and was voted "album of the year" by Jazz and DownBeat magazines. In addition, Coltrane was elected to DownBeat's Hall of Fame, putting him in the company of Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young. At the same time, in the months since ''A Love Supreme'' was recorded, Coltrane's music had be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane (September 23, 1926 – July 17, 1967) was an American jazz saxophonist, bandleader and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th-century music. Born and raised in North Carolina, Coltrane moved to Philadelphia after graduating high school, where he studied music. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes and was one of the players at the forefront of free jazz. He led at least fifty recording sessions and appeared on many albums by other musicians, including trumpeter Miles Davis and pianist Thelonious Monk. Over the course of his career, Coltrane's music took on an increasingly spiritual dimension, as exemplified on his most acclaimed album ''A Love Supreme'' (1965) and others. Decades after his death, Coltrane remains influential, and he has received numerous posthumous awards, including a special Pulitzer Prize, and was canoniz ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Jazz
Free jazz is an experimental approach to jazz improvisation that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s when musicians attempted to change or break down jazz conventions, such as regular tempos, tones, and chord changes. Musicians during this period believed that the bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz that had been played before them was too limiting. They became preoccupied with creating something new and exploring new directions. The term "free jazz" has often been combined with or substituted for the term "avant-garde jazz". Europeans tend to favor the term "free improvisation". Others have used "modern jazz", "creative music", and "art music". The ambiguity of free jazz presents problems of definition. Although it is usually played by small groups or individuals, free jazz big bands have existed. Although musicians and critics claim it is innovative and forward-looking, it draws on early styles of jazz and has been described as an attempt to return to primitive, often ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Tchicai
John Martin Tchicai ( ; 28 April 1936 – 8 October 2012) was a Danish free jazz saxophonist and composer. Biography Tchicai was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, to a Danish mother and a Congolese father. The family moved to Aarhus, where he studied violin when young, and in his mid-teens began playing clarinet and alto saxophone, focusing on the latter. By the late 1950s, he was travelling around northern Europe, playing with many musicians. In 1962, he met trumpeter Bill Dixon and saxophonist Archie Shepp at a festival in Helsinki. At their suggestion, he moved to New York City the following year, and went on to participate in the October Revolution in Jazz and join the New York Contemporary Five and the New York Art Quartet. He also played on a number of influential free jazz recordings, including Shepp's '' Four for Trane'', Albert Ayler's '' New York Eye and Ear Control'', John Coltrane's '' Ascension'', and the Jazz Composer's Orchestra's ''Communication''. Following h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Three For Shepp
''Three for Shepp'' is an album by American saxophonist Marion Brown featuring performances recorded in 1966 for the Impulse! label.Impulse! Records discography accessed April 11, 2011 Reception The review by Thom Jurek awarded the album 4½ stars, stating: "Marion Brown's ''Three for Shepp'' is the image-in-the-mirror companion to Archie Shepp's '' Four for Trane'' recorded the year before. The program is equally divided between Brown's originals, which occupy ...[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marion Brown
Marion Brown (September 8, 1931 – October 18, 2010) was an American jazz alto saxophonist, composer, writer, visual artist, and ethnomusicologist. He was a member of the avant-garde jazz scene in New York City during the 1960s, playing alongside musicians such as John Coltrane, Archie Shepp, and John Tchicai. He performed on Coltrane's landmark 1965 album '' Ascension''. AllMusic reviewer Scott Yanow described him as "one of the brightest and most lyrical voices of the 1960s avant-garde." Biography Early life Brown, the grandson of an escaped slave from Georgia's Sea Islands, was born in Atlanta in 1931 and was raised by a single mother. He began studying the saxophone at an early age, inspired by Charlie Parker. He left high school in the 10th grade and joined the army. During his three-year enlistment, he played alto saxophone, clarinet, and baritone saxophone, and was stationed in Hokkaido for some time. In 1956, he returned to Atlanta and enrolled at Clark College, where ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Four For Trane
''Four for Trane'' is a studio album by tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp released on Impulse! Records in 1965. Four of the five tracks were composed and originally recorded by John Coltrane (released on his albums '' Giant Steps'' and '' Coltrane Plays the Blues'') and rearranged by Shepp and trombonist Roswell Rudd. The other featured players are trumpeter Alan Shorter (brother of Wayne, here playing flugelhorn), alto saxophonist John Tchicai (Shepp’s fellow member of the New York Contemporary Five), bassist Reggie Workman and drummer Charles Moffett (who had worked extensively with Ornette Coleman). Coltrane himself co-produced the album alongside Bob Thiele. The album was Shepp's first release for Impulse! Background According to Coltrane biographer Ashley Kahn, ''Four for Trane'' "was a direct result of Coltrane’s intervention, and his faith in the young tenor saxophonist from Philadelphia." Shepp recalled his efforts to get a recording date with Impulse!: "I had spent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archie Shepp
Archie Shepp (born May 24, 1937) is an American jazz saxophonist, educator and playwright who since the 1960s has played a central part in the development of avant-garde jazz. Biography Early life Shepp was born in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, but raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He studied piano, clarinet and alto saxophone before narrowing his focus to tenor saxophone. He occasionally plays soprano saxophone as well. He studied drama at Goddard College from 1955 to 1959. He played in a Latin jazz band for a short time before joining the band of avant-garde pianist Cecil Taylor. Shepp's first recording under his own name, ''Archie Shepp - Bill Dixon Quartet'', was released on Savoy Records in 1962 and featured a composition by Ornette Coleman. Along with alto saxophonist John Tchicai and trumpeter Don Cherry, he formed the New York Contemporary Five. John Coltrane's admiration for Shepp led to recordings for Impulse! Records, the first of which was '' Four for Trane'' in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Olé Coltrane
''Olé Coltrane'' is an album by jazz musician John Coltrane released in November 1961 on Atlantic Records. The album was recorded at A&R Studios in New York, and was the last of Coltrane's Atlantic albums to be made under his own supervision. Background Two days prior to the recording of ''Olé Coltrane'', Coltrane had made ''Africa/Brass'', his inaugural recording session for his new label, Impulse! Records, at the Van Gelder Studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. With one further album due his old label Atlantic, he brought in his working quintet along with two participants in the ''Africa/Brass'' sessions, Art Davis and Freddie Hubbard. Owing to his concurrent contract with Prestige Records, Eric Dolphy was listed on the credits under the pseudonym George Lane. Coltrane's interest in the music of Spain evident in "Olé", may have been spurred by his ex-employer Miles Davis's ''Sketches of Spain'' from the previous year. The structure and melody of the modal jazz vamp "Olé" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Africa/Brass
''Africa/Brass'' is the eighth studio album by jazz musician John Coltrane, released on September 1, 1961 on Impulse! Records. The sixth release for the fledgling label and Coltrane's first for Impulse!, it features Coltrane's working quartet augmented by a larger ensemble to bring the total number of participating musicians to 21. Its big band sound, with the unusual instrumentation of French horns and euphonium, presented music very different from anything that had been associated with Coltrane to date. While critics originally gave it poor ratings, more recent jazz commentators have described it as "amazing" and as a "key work in understanding the path that John Coltrane's music took in its final phases." Background In 1961, Coltrane came into his own as a front-rank force in jazz, his influence growing from years of live performances with Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis and leading his own groups, and from the impact of the albums '' Giant Steps'' and '' My Favorite Things'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Art Davis
Arthur David Davis (December 6, 1934 – July 29, 2007) was a double-bassist, known for his work with Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, McCoy Tyner and Max Roach. Biography Davis was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, United States, where he began studying the piano at the age of five, switched to tuba, and finally to bass while attending high school. He studied at Juilliard and Manhattan School of Music but graduated from Hunter College. As a New York session musician, he recorded with many jazz and pop musicians and also in symphony orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic and Los Angeles Philharmonic. He recorded with Dizzy Gillespie, Max Roach, and John Coltrane among other jazz musicians. Art Davis was a professor at Orange Coast College. Davis is also known for starting a legal case that led to blind auditions for orchestras. Davis earned a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from New York University in 1982. He moved in 1986 to southern California, where he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Freddie Hubbard
Frederick Dewayne Hubbard (April 7, 1938 – December 29, 2008) was an American jazz trumpeter. He played bebop, hard bop, and post-bop styles from the early 1960s onwards. His unmistakable and influential tone contributed to new perspectives for modern jazz and bebop. Career beginnings Hubbard started playing the mellophone and trumpet in his school band at Arsenal Technical High School in Indianapolis, Indiana. Trumpeter Lee Katzman, former sideman with Stan Kenton, recommended that he begin studying at the Arthur Jordan Conservatory of Music (now the Jordan College of the Arts at Butler University) with Max Woodbury, the principal trumpeter of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. In his teens, Hubbard worked locally with brothers Wes and Monk Montgomery, and worked with bassist Larry Ridley and saxophonist James Spaulding. In 1958, at the age of 20, he moved to New York and began playing with some of the best jazz players of the era, including Philly Joe Jones, S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Albert Ayler
Albert Ayler (; July 13, 1936 – November 25, 1970) was an American avant-garde jazz saxophonist, singer and composer. After early experience playing R&B and bebop, Ayler began recording music during the free jazz era of the 1960s. However, some critics argue that while Ayler's style is undeniably original and unorthodox, it does not adhere to the generally accepted critical understanding of free jazz. In fact, Ayler's style is difficult to categorize in any way, and it evoked incredibly strong and disparate reactions from critics and fans alike.Claghorn, 1982. His innovations have inspired subsequent jazz musicians. His trio and quartet records of 1964, such as '' Spiritual Unity'' and '' The Hilversum Session'', show him advancing the improvisational notions of John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman into abstract realms where whole timbre, and not just mainly harmony with melody, is the music's backbone. His ecstatic music of 1965 and 1966, such as "Spirits Rejoice" and "Tru ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
