From The Book Song Of Praise, 1965.

The John Coltrane Quartet Plays Chim Chim Cheree Song of Praise Nature Boy Brazilia. Impulse A-85. John Col- trane, soprano saxophone on Chim Chim Cheree, tenor saxophone on others; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones, drums. Add Art Davis, bass, on Nature Boy.

It seems to me that there shouldn’t need to be much said about John Coltrane’s music anymore—a new record’s released, Impulse puts its ad in downbeat, & then everybody just goes out to the store & brings the record back home & listens to it.

It should be as simple as that. Like, anyone with ears knows (or at least, should know) what John’s been doing all these years, what a tremendous & singular beauty he’s been creating, & how this beauty increases daily. But folks are so obtuse that literally thousands & thousands of words still have to be written “about” John’s music, & still huge confusion & mis- understanding exists as to these men’s motives, needs, & actual music. Which fact speaks clearer than anything else— even more clearly then say, the music itself—of the jungle of chaos tjis world we “live” in has become. When even the most benevolent & illuminating voices out here are taken for some- thing other than what they in fact are—words of love, sounds of beauty.

“John Coltrane can do this for us”
teach us to stand
like men
in the face of the most devas-
tating insensi-
tivity. Can touch us
where the hand or mouth or
eye
can’t go. can see. can be
a man. make a love
from centuries of unplumbed music
& a common metal tool
anyone can misuse.

The tool John Coltrane has made of his music is as accessible to us as our selves are. As, say, Chim Chim Cheree is, which serves—like Archie Shepp’s Girl From Ipanema—as a valuable lesson in the use of whatever materials exist, in whatever form, for one’s own purposes. Or, as Walt Disney made the song available, as “music” for one of his obscene films, John Coltrane found it & made actual living music out of it. As we all can, from whatever silly objects we find in front of us, in this world.

Nature Boy, too, had already found an existence for itself in this world, & made itself useful to us before as a thing of rather simple beauty, e.g. in Nat Cole’s and Miles Davis’s songs of it. “Once there was a boy, a very strange en- /chanted boy,” &c. Then John Coltrane

took this boy, be-
came this boy, &
disappeared
into the actual jungle
of that boy’s “nature”

It seems to me that there shouldn’t need to be much said about John Coltrane’s music anymore—a new record’s released, Impulse puts its ad in DOWNBEAT, & then everybody just goes out to the store & brings the record back home & listens to it. It should be as simple as that. Like, amyone with ears knows (or at least, should know) what John’s been doing all these years, what a tremendous & singular beauty he’s been creating & how this beauty increases daily. But folks are so obtuse
that literally thousands & thousands of words still have to be\ written “about” John’s music, & still huge confusion & mis-understanding exists as to these men’s motives, needs, & actual music. Which fact speaks clearer than naything else— even more clearly then say, the music itself—of the junglr of chaos this world we “live” in has become. When even the most benevolent & illuminating voices out here are taken for some- thing other than what they in fact are—words of love, sounds of beauty.

I write out of need—It’s that simple—I write because I need to write, on whatever level, as, it makes living in this world possible. John Coltrane’s music likewise comes out of that need, & likewise makes a life possible, for him, as maker, as well as for me, listening, here, wherever I am. John Coltrane’s music suggests possibilities of feeling, emotion, thought—of life finally—that we all of us can make use of—& should. Any other use of his art--his music—of which we have the most concrete evidence imaginable, i.e. his recordings and his nightly work before audiences everywhere—is one of the most valuable (i.e. useful) tools we have.

hear Art Davis & Jimmy Garrison in-
vent this nature, this
jungle, make it real, as
Elvin & McCoy do, as

Trane does, as he ex-
plores it, the “jungle of e-
motion, feeling, judge-
ments,” the
mind of this boy, his
nature, that of
all of us

Nature Boy is some of the most a- mazing music this group has ever made. Brazilia & Song of Praise too. & let me here just advertise Jimmmy Garrison’s bass work on the latter±—he plays there, as he does so much now, s if on a guitar, his instrument is hatt acccessiblle to him, as his mind is. As our selves are.

Enough. But let me just say that if you know & love John Coltrane’s music as I do, this latest recording will come as no surprise to you, & you will take it to heart—straight o heart—as I have. If you don’t know John Coltrane’s music, you can start here, or anywhere. If you don’t love John Coltrane’s music, then,

what
ever can I tell you,
who are you. where did you
come from, to get
this way. Or
this far. how did you
ever make it.

—Detroit September 1965

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