The Sun Ra Arkestra comes to San Francisco this week, and if you’re like most people, you probably find his discography overwhelming. Even diehard fans of Sun Ra, the pianist and bandleader who departed this Earthly plane 30 years ago, regularly discover new material spread across hundreds of releases.
The vast world of Sun Ra’s spaceways is unlike anything in the history of recorded American music. Spanning over four decades, it keeps one foot in the big-band stylings of major figures like Fletcher Henderson and Duke Ellington, and one in the infinite universe of free jazz and electronic synthesizers.
The band’s shows in San Francisco, in fact, are split along these lines: two nights of the “exploratory side of Sun Ra,” and two nights of a more traditional big-band sound. And while 99-year-old bandleader Marshall Allen won’t be on the stand (he recently stopped touring outside the Philadelphia area), the spirit of refined exploration should be wholly present.
For a newcomer, where to start? Below are five landmark Sun Ra compositions to start you on your journey.
‘Sunology’
An early tune that wouldn’t be out of place at the Savoy Ballroom in the late 1940s, Sun Ra referred to this as “a different kind of blues.” Note the Eastern influence and the wordplay of the title (“Sun-knowledge-y”), common markers in Sun Ra’s work.
