PHAROAH SANDERS: Live at the Jazz Cafe

The Jazz café is very proud to welcome back a true jazz survivor; a musician who played a pivotal role on some of the greatest jazz recordings of the century, as well as carving out his own unique niche in the history of jazz.

Saxophonist Pharoah Sanders, originally Farrell Sanders, from Little Rock, Arkansas, first came to prominence in California’s bustling jazz scene of the early 1960s. By the middle of the decade he had moved to New York, where he began to work with Sun Ra and other luminaries of the new jazz avant garde. He was asked by John Coltrane to join his group in 1965, and so became an integral member of Coltrane’s most experimental unit. Some of Sanders’ best playing of this early period with Coltrane appeared on Live In Seattle and Live At The Village Vanguard Again! When Coltrane died in 1967, Sanders continued to play with his pianist/wife Alice Coltrane (1969-‘70), as well as singer Leon Thomas. His solo albums of this period combine the fierce, free-jazz elements of before with hypnotic, modal vamps, The Creator Has A Master Plan being typical.

Sanders is known for his distinctive bright tenor sound, including a split reed technique, also employed by Coltrane, where two notes are produced simultaneously on the saxophone. While primarily playing the tenor sax, he has also recorded on soprano sax, flutes, and percussion. He can coax unearthly sounds from the tenor horn, and, according to jazz legend, can cause a saxophone to continue to shriek for minutes after removing it from his mouth.

Pharoah Sanders Saxophone

William Henderson Piano

Nat Reeves Bass

Joe Farnsworth Drums