V.1 HELIOCENTRIC WORLDS

HELIOCENTRIC WORLDS VOL. 1 charts a period in the Sun Ra Arkestra's development (the mid-1960s) when Sun Ra was experimenting with orchestral improvisation, conducting sections of his ensemble both into and away from an expressionistic whole. Here Ra's music is completely stripped of its swing and bop roots, and even of the solid rhythmic principles that defined it in the early '60s. Working instead with atonality, silence, delicate ambient passages, and bold swaths of noise, Ra builds an increasingly abstract and wholly unprecedented sound here.
There are seven compositions on HELIOCENTRIC WORLDS VOL. 1, and each is characterised by Sun Ra's feel for contrasts. Low-end instruments (tympani, bass, baritone sax and other low-end horns, and bass marimba) bounce off high-end instruments (trumpets and saxophone) in a sometimes-delicate, sometimes-violent teeter-totter. Pieces like the "The Cosmos", though full of jittery, frantic passages, are restrained by a soft dynamic (a feeling heightened by the presence of electronic celeste--played by Ra). While Sun Ra's later experiments (which included copious chanting and theatrical trappings) sometimes threatened to overshadow the songs themselves, the music on HELIOCENTRIC WORLDS is challenging, beautiful, and totally engaging.|