Saxophone legend John Coltrane's 1964 recording, A Love Supreme is one of the masterworks in the canon of jazz. John Coltrane is one of those rare musical figures who transcend both his time and category. Today, in addition to jazz fans, rockers and rappers, head-bangers and hip-hoppers all swear their allegiance to him. And no album in his catalog reaches a wider audience than A Love Supreme, what he called his humble offering to God.
A Love Supreme was the culmination of a period of restlessness and searching for Coltrane, both in his personal and professional lives. Coltrane experienced a period of depression, followed by what he called "a spiritual awakening". Following intense meditation and prayer, Coltrane gave up drinking, smoking, and his destructive drug habit. By the spring of 1957, Coltrane was back in form and worked briefly with Thelonius Monk, a period that he later stated influenced him greatly.
During the seven year period from 1957 to 1964, Coltrane began to become interested in nonwestern music and philosophy. He explored West African music as well as the music of India. Though he had considered himself a Christian all his life, he began to read books about Hinduism, Islam, science, astrology, yoga, and African history.
A love Supreme begins with "Acknowledgment". "Acknowledgement" is the awakening of sorts that trails off to the famous chanting of the theme at the end, which yields to the second act, Resolution, an amazingly beautiful piece about the fury of dedication to a new path of understanding. The music has a sort of 1920s black jazz feel to it. Coltrane's declamatory statements seem to offer a sermon. His playing is incredibly confident and robust, offering the kind of bold and powerful statement. He develops the material rhythmically and moves a series of four notes through a modular cycle or repetition, punctuating it with excursions into the altissimo range, finally bursting into a climax of ecstatic celebration.
