Originally Posted By: bluage
That's my kind of jazz! Bright, driving, upbeat, and all lit-up with the glow from a percolatin' Hammond organ! The "changes" in the song -- and your musicianship in performing them -- are exhilarating.

It took me a l-o-n-g time to "get my head around" Mr. Coltrane's music. And then, one day I read that at a particular moment in his life when his addiction to drugs had him hanging by his fingernails at the edge of the "abyss", he told the "The Creator" that if He would help him get that "monkey off his back" that he would devote his life and his music to the glorification of God.

Up to that time I was not aware of any jazz musician who had made such a direct statement of the role that spirituality -- not religion -- played in his/her life. But after reading that, I didn't have any more problems "understanding" what Mr. Coltrane was doing, and why he was doing it.

Hoping to hear more of this
Bluage, man, you have made my day. I'm grateful for your kind response, but I really want to chime in with "Yeah, Bluage, that's my kinda jazz too! Sure, the changes - so cool. And as far as the Hammond B3 goes, I rate it alongside the invention of the wheel as one of humankind's greatest creation, and the Hammond SK-1 the greatest invention since the B3.

Dean Clark (aka "Aleck Rand")

PS I think it took everyone a long time to get their heads around 'Trane's concept. The spirituality angle is another issue. Do you remember Sun Ra? He had a fairly bizarre "interplanetary philosophy" of some kind, but his is the only name that comes to mind. I think too many jazz players got their spirituality out of the end of a needle.