Deaf Dumb Blind (Summun Bukmun Umyun) cover

Deaf Dumb Blind (Summun Bukmun Umyun)

Released

Pharoah Sanders’ follow-up to the unexpected counterculture hit Karma was this album of dense, polyrhythmic Afro-jazz improvisation featuring some amazing musicians: Woody Shaw on trumpet, Gary Bartz on alto sax, Lonnie Liston Smith on piano, Cecil McBee on bass, Clifford Jarvis on drums, and Anthony Wiles and Nat Bettis on percussion. (Most of the other players contributed percussion, too.) Its two side-long pieces, “Summun Bukmun Umyun” and “Let Us Go Into The House Of The Lord,” feel endless, but in a good way. Solos rise up, then vanish again, like fish leaping out of a river; congas and shakers and bells and African thumb pianos jangle and rattle and hiss and ping, and Smith’s piano shimmers like sunlight on a lake.

Phil Freeman

Recommended by

Suggestions
Songs You Like a Lot cover

Songs You Like a Lot

Gary Versace, John Hollenbeck, Theo Bleckmann, Kate McGarry
FRKWYS Vol. 13: Sunergy cover

FRKWYS Vol. 13: Sunergy

Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, Suzanne Ciani
Homeland cover

Homeland

Laurie Anderson
The Trance of Seven Colors cover

The Trance of Seven Colors

Maleem Mahmoud Ghania, Pharoah Sanders
Nice Guys cover

Nice Guys

Art Ensemble of Chicago
Baden-Baden '75 cover

Baden-Baden '75

Globe Unity Orchestra