KingsOfKings
𝔻𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕞 𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕥
Meshell Ndegeocello is spearheading the next installment in the ongoing Sun Ra tribute series, Red Hot + Ra, with the LP Red Hot & Ra: The Magic City, out April 12.
The LP isn’t a traditional “tribute” album filled with covers. Rather, Ndegeocello and her numerous collaborators honored Sun Ra with totally new compositions that used the intergalactic jazz giant’s ideas, words, and melodies.
The first offering from the album, “#9 Venus the Living Myth,” incorporates elements from Sun Ra’s “Rocket Number 9” and “The Living Myth” and features a saxophone duet between Sun Ra Arkestra leader Marshall Allen and rising Philadelphia jazz star Immanuel Wilkins. It’s actually a reunion of sorts, as Wilkins performed a series of shows with the Arkestra back when he was just 10 years old
Ndegeocello’s work on The Magic City — as well as her recent Grammy-winning Blue Note album The Omnichord Real Book — was deeply influenced by reading John Szwed’s biography of the jazz legend, Space Is the Place: The Lives and Times of Sun Ra.
“I haven’t been the same since reading that book,” she said in a statement. “I think it’s what inspired The Omnichord Real Book, in the sense of, ‘what happens when you’re no longer driven by youth?’ Sun Ra’s music is a living organism, and once you immerse yourself in his work, his life, you recognize there’s a fork in the road — that you really have to make choices, because there’s so many other realms and dimensions to explore Musically.”
She added: “I want people to walk away [from this album] understanding that [life] is really of your own design. The mind is the only part we really have control over, and do the best to live the life you want to live.”
The LP isn’t a traditional “tribute” album filled with covers. Rather, Ndegeocello and her numerous collaborators honored Sun Ra with totally new compositions that used the intergalactic jazz giant’s ideas, words, and melodies.
The first offering from the album, “#9 Venus the Living Myth,” incorporates elements from Sun Ra’s “Rocket Number 9” and “The Living Myth” and features a saxophone duet between Sun Ra Arkestra leader Marshall Allen and rising Philadelphia jazz star Immanuel Wilkins. It’s actually a reunion of sorts, as Wilkins performed a series of shows with the Arkestra back when he was just 10 years old
Ndegeocello’s work on The Magic City — as well as her recent Grammy-winning Blue Note album The Omnichord Real Book — was deeply influenced by reading John Szwed’s biography of the jazz legend, Space Is the Place: The Lives and Times of Sun Ra.
“I haven’t been the same since reading that book,” she said in a statement. “I think it’s what inspired The Omnichord Real Book, in the sense of, ‘what happens when you’re no longer driven by youth?’ Sun Ra’s music is a living organism, and once you immerse yourself in his work, his life, you recognize there’s a fork in the road — that you really have to make choices, because there’s so many other realms and dimensions to explore Musically.”
She added: “I want people to walk away [from this album] understanding that [life] is really of your own design. The mind is the only part we really have control over, and do the best to live the life you want to live.”