Live at the Village Vanguard Again!

John Coltrane’s 1961 album Live at the Village Vanguard was a major milestone in his artistic development; that string of gigs was so productive that eventually a four-CD boxed set of the complete recordings was released. This album, recorded five years later, has not attained the stature of its predecessor, though it was the only recording of the Pharoah Sanders/Alice Coltrane/Jimmy Garrison/Rashied Ali quintet to be released in the leader’s lifetime. The band performs two tunes from Coltrane’s pre-free jazz career, the ballad “Naima” and his signature piece, “My Favorite Things,” with a six-minute Garrison bass solo preceding the latter. The contrast between Coltrane and Sanders is particularly vivid on “Naima” — the former man is playing in a free but still lyrical and melodic manner, while the latter opts for almost pure sound, seemingly on the brink of going completely out of control but never quite doing so (and thus in his own way demonstrating that his fierce style was the product of absolute mastery of the horn).