What are you listening to right now?

Between Father Sky and Mother Earth
A Native Amerivan Collection
NARADA

Ch'uwa Yacu Bolivia VII
Tinkunakama

The soft tapping of rain drops on foilage is one of my favorite things.

Prince Nico Mbarga: Sweet Mother

My neighbors in high rut.

Dummy (Portishead)

"I've Been Losing You" ~ a-ha

MC5

Wynton Marsalis "Standard Time Vol 2: Intimacy Calling."

Yanni
Reflections Of Passion

Yanni
If I Could Tell You

"Dancing In The Dark" ~ Bruce Springsteen

Teagen and Sara-This is Everything

Tenku
Kitaro

Franz Schubert D 911
Winterreise
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau-Baritone
Jörg Demus-Piano

"Until There's Another Sunrise" ~ The Mission

Gato Barbieri
Caliente!

John Coltrane--A Love Supreme

...wondering what makes this, for many people, the ultimate in jazz greatness?

Oh, Kicky, that IS the ultimate. (If it needs explaining why, then it's not the ultimate.) I've got Oscar Peterson doing duets with Count Basie on right now.

Don't get me wrong, I do like it...I just wonder. Of all the millions and millions of jazz recordings, this one gets to that status...what is it about it that makes it so much better than, for example, Miles Davis' Kind of Blue? Or Billie Holiday's version of Autumn in New York? or any of about a thousand other very worthy songs? I just wonder. Not that it really matters. It's all good.

They are all good!

I have to agree Kicky. There's other Coltrane albums that I'll rank ahead of A Love Supreme: Like Giant Steps...but...

There are many jazz purists who felt Coltrane reached a nadir

"A Love Supreme heralded Coltrane's search for spiritual and musical freedom, as expressed through polyrhythms, modalities, and purely vertical forms that seemed strange to some jazz purists, but which captivated more adventurous listeners (and rock fellow travelers such as the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Cream, and the Byrds),"

(Listen to Roger McGuinns opening solo on Eight Miles High where he quotes Coltrane.)

I believe what's impotant is not what the artist achieves ,but what the listener interprets.