World Spirituality Classics, Volume 1: The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda

Richard Gehr on June 26, 2017

World Spirituality Classics, Volume 1: The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda cherry-picks four albums that John Coltrane’s widow, a great jazz improviser in her own right, recorded between 1982 and ‘95 while leading the mostly African-American Sai Anantam Ashram in Southern California. Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda’s music draws from Vedic devotional chants, solo bhajans and participatory Kirtans that she often accompanies on an Oberheim OB-8 analog synthesizer that produces swooning string arrangements as well as swooping science-fiction effects. In short, Alice’s music sounds like nothing else you’ve heard, or maybe a gospel-choir field trip to Nepal.

Artist: Alice Coltrane
Album: World Spirituality Classics, Volume 1: The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda
Label: Luaka Bop