Transcendence (Impulse In A Spiritual Groove)

Patrick Forge and Kerstan Mackness, the two compilers of this collection and of various other Impulse! samplers, have come up with an insightful way to present the wealth of material from the label's catalog. For starters, to create a compilation of "spiritually related material" from the label without including John Coltrane is ambitious and gutsy, but proves to be a solid idea and the payoff is big. Secondly, rather than just picking one cut by a given artist, presenting myriad offerings creates the possibility for other excellent volumes on the same theme. Here, Alice Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders are given three cuts each, while Albert Ayler, Archie Shepp, John Klemmer, and Michael White are given one apiece. The mood is constant, reflective, poignant, and ethereal, from Sanders' "Greetings to Saud" and Alice Coltrane's "Galaxy in Satchidananda" to White's gorgeously funky "In the Silence Listen" and Ayler's "Music Is the Healing Force of the Universe," closing with Coltrane's "Huntington Ashram Monastery." The spaces in between, such as the unlikely but excellent choice of Klemmer's "Utopia: Man's Dream, Pt. 1" and Shepp's "A Prayer," offer differing and highly complementary approaches to the expression of spirituality in jazz. Again, while many will feel that the exclusion of John Coltrane's work and perhaps Yusef Lateef's as well are glaring omissions, they were made on purpose to showcase something less obvious, more subtle, and reliant on the merit of the material rather than the name of the man who created it all in the first place. This is a great place to start; here's to more from the well. ~ Thom Jurek|