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A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album | 
| Author: Ashley Kahn
Publisher: Viking Adult
Category: Book
List Price: $27.95
Buy New: $11.29
You Save: $16.66 (60%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  15 reviews
Sales Rank: 1323217
Format: Bargain Price
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
ASIN: B0002Y1256
Publication Date: October 1, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Bringing the same fresh and engaging approach to music that characterized his critically acclaimed Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece, Ashley Kahn has written an even more illuminating celebration of saxophone legend John Coltrane's 1964 spiritual opus and masterwork. A Love Supreme is a passionate and revealing portrait of a timelessly resonant musical statement, artfully balancing biography, analysis, and a palpable enthusiasm that anyone from the casual listener to the avid fan will enjoy.
A Love Supreme was written with the full cooperation of Coltrane's family and features the voices of more than a hundred musicians, producers, and witnesses, including the surviving participants in the album: Elvin Jones, pianist McCoy Tyner, and engineer Rudy Van Gelder. With unpublished interviews with Coltrane and bassist Jimmy Garrison and scores of never-before-seen photographs, A Love Supreme weaves a rich historical backdrop to the 1964 recording and examines the questions and myths surrounding the album.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
 An Excellent, Informative Read July 14, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
You KNOW the music. Now learn about the events in the life of John Coltrane that lead up to the pinnacle, the mountaintop of his career.
First of all, let me explain that I have a substantial library on jazz music - mostly about Miles and Trane. I found this book to be very insightful, regardless of what anyone else has written in their review. I don't want to be disrespectful of those reviews but I fail to see how some arrived at a mediocre or low opinion of this book. Not at all! In fact, I've learned so much and enjoyed this book so much that I'm definitely going to purchase Kahn's Making of Kind of Blue and Impulse the House That Trane Built. Personally, I can't wait to read 'em!
Kahn provides first hand accounts of both the December 9 & 10 sessions at Rudy Van Gelder's studio from Archie Shepp, Art Davis, McCoy Tyner, Elvin Jones, Bob Theil, and of course Rudy himself.
The book tells us what made recording at Rudy's so special, he describes the studio and even gives a high-level look at Van Gelder's methodology (the details are Rudy's closely guarded secret).
There is a title by title analysis of the suite in layman's terms but he & Ravi Coltrane DO give the listener some sign-posts to listen for each time you listen to the suite. I know that as a semi-professional jazz musician, I've learned new things about this music that I can actually apply to my own playing.
The description of how Impulse started, how they packaged and produced the recordings and took them to market was fascinating (to me anyway). I learned some things that I'd always wondered about. There is some discussion on Billboard and how the news about this fantastic work of art quickly spread 'round the USA.
There is a chapter toward the end "The Unbroken Arc of A Love Supreme" where I felt like Kahn was flirting with becoming trite and a little over-the-top but thankfully, he didn't quite go there... but it was close. That is my only criticism of this book. He just goes a little over-board with the reverence for this music, i.e., he sort of hits the reader over the head again and again with it. Ok, I get it. This is a special recording. Of course, we already KNOW that otherwise we wouldn't be reading a book devoted to a specific recording. Duh? It's not an annoyance but some reader may begin rolling their eyes, let's put it that way.
This book is perfect for the non-musician and a great read for musicians. The only downside (if you can call it that) for musicians is that there really isn't a detailed analysis of the music - no transcripts. If you are a musician you will want to purchase Lewis Porter's John Coltrane: His Life and Music. That book will give you transcripts galore. In fact, Porter is cited often in this book & this book is cited often in the Porter book. I enthusiastically recommend both books and of course, the deluxe edition of A Love Supreme. Buy them all, I guarantee whether you are a musician or just a jazz lover, you are going to learn something.
One More Session For A True Expressionist September 6, 2007
What can be said about this album?; on this book are mentioned details about this historic spiritual session that any music, jazz fan must indeed know. Read it and grow.
Great book! February 11, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
"A Love Supreme" was already one of my favourite jazz record before I read this, but after having read the book, now I listen to the music in a totally different way.
I'm not a spiritual or religious person at all, but the book helped me understand what was probably going through Coltrane's mind (from a spiritual point of view) when he composed and recorded "A Love Supreme".
 Homage or Adulation? October 14, 2005
9 out of 9 found this review helpful
Kahn's stellar research for this volume on Coltrane's best known album, "A Love Supreme," is undermined by sloppy prose and lack of focus. Kahn does a great job showing just how powerful the album has been for generations of listeners, from Wayne Shorter to Bono. The biographical material on Coltrane is very good, but profoundly impersonal, skipping over key aspects of his life. The best part of the book is his meticulous documentation of the December 9 & 10, 1964 sessions that resulted in this album. Kahn describes the music with vivid language, and includes details about where Elvin Jones' drums were placed and how Rudy Van Gelder lit the studio to create a Jazz Club atmosphere for the performers. After that, Kahn's book loses focus. It's as if he had a 100 page manuscript, but then the folks at Penguin asked him to make it 250, and he had scratch around for any extra material he could find. His assessment of Coltrane's career post-"A Love Supreme" is very tepid, and the chapter on the legacy of the recording, especially from the vantagepoint of JOWCOL publishing, shows promise, but ultimately goes nowhere. Kahn's major problem here is that he doesn't know who his audience is. Is it for die-hard Trane-iacs, or is it for the casual listener that has "A Love Supreme" and no other Coltrane album? Some of this might not be Kahn's fault, as the content suggests this is for experts, but the formating of the book, with its wide margins and coffee-table book size, make it seem as if it's simply for show and tell in some bourgeois apartment. The book could have been better organized, more historically contextual, and filled with glossaries and footnotes for the more casual fans. Also, Kahn's lack of historical grounding makes it seem as though "A Love Supreme" was the only album released in 1965, and that jazz was the most popular music at that time, which is far from the case (just as it is today). Here, his homage to this wonderful album bleeds over into the realm of adulation. If this was a book for the "experts," it would be more critical of the album, instead of an all-out gush-fest. But Kahn's research must be commended (especially since he seems to be responsible for getting the December 10th performance of "Acknowledgment," with Davis and Shepp as added musicians, unearthed and onto the Deluxe Edition reissue of "A Love Supreme).
This book is really good! March 31, 2005
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
Ashley Khan did a great job. I first picked up Coltrane's A Love Supreme, in the early 90's while a teenager, in a used section of a Parisian jazz record store, at that time i was only basicly educated about music and jazz. When i first played that album i was spiritualy moved and fell in love with it. I had no idea then of the importance of that record in Coltrane's career or in jazz in general, but the music touched my soul, and took me on a journey, which have been my (still young) life's journey and spiritual quest.
For the past 10 years i have been playing that record before evey major key events of my life... as a way to pray and meditate... i had no idea this album have been such a spiritual listening experience for other people before i started learning more about Coltrane and music. For this, Kahn's book is a very good illustration of the importance of that particular record. It is well written, have beautifull pictures and some precious informations. It contains basic elements about Coltrane's life, but reading Colrane's bio can remain a necessity. The making of a love supreme is a must read. Peace.
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