Impulse! Records are getting a head start on a batch of archival releases hitting next month with its release of Alice Coltrane – The Carnegie Hall Concert, the full recording from the historic performance in 1971. That night’s bill also included Laura Nyro and The Rascals with Coltrane in the middle spot. Such were the times). Alice Coltrane, performing for the first time at the hallowed venue, had just released her fourth solo album, Journey in Satchidananda, a landmark album renowned for its mix of exploratory African and American blues, modal jazz, drone, and Eastern music designed to be a healing force. The album’s title track is one of her most enduring compositions. During this same time, Alice had dug deeper into her spiritual quest, having just returned from a five-week sojourn in India where she studied with Swami Satchidananda who gave the opening speech at Woodstock and founded the Integral Yoga Institute, for which the concert was a benefit.
The album contains just four extensive tracks. The single “Shiva-Loka” is also from Journey in Satchidananda while the second side of the LP contains two John Coltrane compositions – “Africa” and “Leo.” Alice basically used a double quartet in the vein of Ornette Coleman’s Twins and Miles’ Bitches Brew. Joining Coltrane on harp, piano, and percussion are Pharoah Sanders (tenor and soprano saxophone, flute, fifes, and percussion who played on ‘Journey’ and is heard on the right channel, Archie Shepp (tenor and soprano, heard on left channel) as well as two bassists, Cecil McBee who also played on ‘Journey’ (left channel) and Jimmy Garrison (right channel), from John Coltrane’s Classic Quartet. While the original album had Rasheed Ali on drums, Alice enlisted both Ed Blackwell (Don Cherry, John Coltrane, Archie Shepp, left channel) and Clifford Jarvis (Pharoah Sanders, right channel) for this date. Also aboard are Kumar Kramer and Tulsi Reynolds, playing harmonium and tamboura respectively.
“Journey in Satchidananda” begins with cymbal flourishes and Cecil McBee’s indelible bass intro with murmurs of the harmonium and tamboura before Alice strums shimmering notes on her harp. The sound quality is crystalline; remarkable considering how long this has been sitting in the vaults. The tone remains most serene for the first five and half minutes with Sanders entering in a restrained fashion on flute (he only played soprano on the studio album), with Shepp joining on soprano (which is faint because it begins off-mic) and tambourine. Harp arpeggios run through the piece, a brief vamp for the two basses, an emphatic harp statement, a brief Shepp turn, and a serene conclusion. “Shiva Loka” opens with swirling harp and arco bass, drums and Blackwell’s cowbell sets the stage for the two sopranos – Shepp first, later joined by Sanders with the full ensemble carrying vamps until the final four minutes are consumed by more harp swirls, basses, and drums, albeit a few squawks from the sopranos.
Alice shifts to the piano in the second half, beginning with John Coltrane’s “Africa” (which runs close to 30 minutes) from his 1961 Africa/Brass. At first, it’s Shepp on tenor cutting through a maelstrom of piano, basses, and drums followed by an equally incendiary, shrieking Sanders’s solo on tenor before Alice takes a piano solo with Sanders on fifes off mic as the drums and basses build to a furious storm. The audience applauds after Jimmy Garrison’s bass solo thinking it’s over but the tenors and piano resume to take it out. This music is by contrast so ridiculously intense compared to the first half
John Coltrane’s “Leo” was first recorded in 1966 with Alice, Sanders, and Garrison but not released until 1972, Infinity. Drums open, and the two tenors unleash their fury, eventually, Alice plays her piano like a banshee possessed, with the ensemble shifting from extreme to calm passages. We hear solos from both drummers before the ensemble returns, taking it out to a rousing audience reception. Listening back to this live performance today, McBee says, “I’ve never heard anything that I played that was that more intense, that intense and that well designed as improvisation is concerned. It was absolutely amazing.” Now you can hear this off-the-charts intensity too.
