Her third, 1970 album, the brilliant summation of her folky start — with favourites like Woodstock, Big Yellow Taxi and The Circle Game.
The LP is newly remastered by Bernie Grundman under the supervision of Joni Mitchell.

From 1960; ostensibly before Mingus heard Charlie Parker.
A host of stellar players — including Eric Dolphy, Booker Ervin, Max Roach, Marcus Belgrave, Slide Hampton, Yusef Lateef — in variously large ensembles, reading mostly tight, post-Duke scores.
Kicks off startlingly with a mash-up of Take the A Train, in the left channel, and Exactly Like You in the right. ( On the flip, Do Nothin’ Till You Hear From Me is likewise bundled with I Let a Song Go Out of My Heart.)
The great Mingus art songs Eclipse — hymning black-white relationships — and Weird Nightmare are here. Apparently vocalist Lorraine Cusson fluffed the last line of Nightmare — singing ‘Bring me a heart with a love of gold’ instead of ‘Bring me a love with a heart of gold’ — but Mingus was so happy with the take, he let it go.

Good old-fashioned bopping out at Van Gelder’s in 1989 with chums Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins from early Ornette days; and sensationally bringing back Texas Tenorman James Clay, DC’s spar in late-50s California, and avowedly a key musical influence. It’s a celebratory, self-affirming set: three OCs, Bemsha Swing, a rootical solo Haden and a sparkling solo Cherry, Body And Soul, I’ve Grown Accustomed To Your Face… Look back in love. Everyone plays masterfully.
‘Verve By Request’.

‘Classic Vinyl’ series.

With George Coleman, Joe Farrell, Pepper Adams, Wilbur Little, and Candido.

Booker Ervin! Mira!

‘Verve By Request.’

Scintillating hard bop. Young Donald with Messengers Art Blakey, Horace Silver, Hank Mobley, Doug Watkins, and Joe Gordon.
Originally released by Tom Wilson’s shoestring Transition label in 1955. The same label which released Sun Ra’s and Cecil Taylor’s first records; the same Tom who produced Bob Dylan and Simon & Garfunkel, Freak Out! and The Velvet Underground & Nico .

‘Classic Vinyl.’

Outstanding, spiritualised jazz-funk; keenly focussed but free and warm; steeped in post-bop and wide-open to r&b; somewhere between Lonnie Liston Smith’s Cosmic Echoes and Roy Ayers’ Ubiquity. Plenty here for dancers, chin-strokers and dreamers all.
The personnel discloses generous musical co-ordinates… Marvin Blackman from the Rashied Ali Quartet is here, and Ryo Kawasaki. James Mason and Justo Almario were later collaborators. Just a couple of years before this, Tarika Blue leader Phil Clendeninn was playing in a New York funk outfit alongside Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards…

Over to our friends at Soundohm in Milan…

‘The album begins with the throbbing three parts of its title track, collectively clocking in at just under 17 minutes. Underpinned by a tambura drone, heavily rooted in the percussive and rhythmic drive of the ensemble, Sanders soars through modal lines on saxophone (and sometimes voice) in a dance with Sedatrius Brown’s largely wordless vocals… some of the most engrossing and boundary-pushing spiritual jazz ever recorded…. before rounding out the first side with the brilliant, drone-like Myth, which features the bulk of the ensemble in states of chant… The second side begins with the ethereal spiritual jazz piece Mansion Worlds, featuring the majority of the ensemble making up the rhythm section while Joe Bonner delivers shimmering lines on piano and Sanders threads himself through it all… before drifting into the balladic and dreamy Memories Of Lee Morgan. The finale Went Like It Came takes a brilliant and unexpected turn, nodding to Sanders’ roots with Sun Ra. Swinging and raucous — taking on elements from classic R&B — it’s one of the those rare pieces by the saxophonist that makes you want to tap your foot and dance, while still retaining the heat of free jazz fire.
‘Truly staggering on every count, Village of the Pharoahs is one hell of a journey. Unquestionably one of our favourite Pharoah Sanders records of all time.’