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Le Sony'r Ra, better known as Sun Ra (born Herman Poole Blount, May 22nd, 1914 – May 30th, 1993), was an American composer, jazz musician, bandleader, piano and synthesizer player, and poet known for his experimental music, "cosmic" philosophy, prolific output, and theatrical performances. From the 1950s until his retirement in 1992, Ra led the musical collective The Arkestra, an ensemble with an ever-changing name and flexible line-up.
Sun Ra died on May 30th, 1993, aged 79, having produced one of the largest and most diverse musical bodies of work of the 20th century. He has been recognized for his influence, both as a pioneer of Afrofuturism and as a musical influence by many experimental and avant-garde acts that followed, including The Residents, who have frequently cited Sun Ra as a formative influence; members of the group are known to be long-time admirers of his work.
Biography[]
Born and raised in Birmingham, Alabama, Herman Poole Blount became involved in the Chicago jazz scene during the late 1940s. Supposedly following a visionary experience in 1936 or 1937, Blount abandoned his birth name, taking the name Le Sony'r Ra (shortened to Sun Ra, after Ra, the Egyptian god of the Sun), Claiming to be an alien from Saturn on a mission to preach peace, Ra developed a mythical and idiosyncratic persona.
Over the course of Sun Ra's career, he recorded dozens of singles and over one hundred full-length albums, comprising well over one thousand compositions (ranging from keyboard solos to works for bands of over thirty musicians, along with electronic excursions, chants, anthems and percussion pieces), producing one of the largest discographies in music history.
Though his mainstream success was limited, Ra was a prolific recording artist and frequent live performer, and remained influential throughout his life for his music and persona. He is now widely considered an innovator; among his distinctions are his pioneering work in free improvisation and modal jazz and his early use of electronic keyboards and synthesizers.
Following a stroke in 1990, Sun Ra continued to record, compose and lead the Arkestra until 1992, when illness forced him to retire to his birth city of Birmingham, Alabama, where he was cared for by his sister in his final years. He died in hospital on May 30th 1993, aged 79. His band remained active as The Sun Ra Arkestra, and, as of 2023, has continued to perform under the leadership of veteran Ra sideman Marshall Allen.
Sun Ra and The Residents[]
The Residents are noted as long-time admirers of Sun Ra, considering him a formative influence on their own work, particularly Ra's concept of "magic as stagecraft, illusion, creating things in the mind of your audience that is so much stronger than reality".[1]
The Residents' communal record collection in the 1970s is said to have contained "a bunch" of Sun Ra albums.[2] Members of The Residents are said to have once hired themselves out as waiters at a restaurant in San Francisco near where Ra was shooting a film (most likely Space is the Place), in an attempt to meet him; the group served Ra's table, and having been able to observe him closely, concluded that his persona was not an act.
In the mid-1980s, the group considered Ra as one of the composers they would reinterpret for their planned American Composers Series of albums. They are known to have recorded a side-length suite of Sun Ra material during this time, a portion of which was included in the track "Daydream in Space"; the group have been said to have planned to pair Sun Ra's material with that of either Ray Charles or Buddy Holly.[3][4]
The Residents' manager Homer Flynn saw Sun Ra perform "seven or eight times, at least", further stating that, if he listed the greatest performances he had seen, "there would be three Sun Ra shows in there".[1]
Discography[]
- see Wikipedia article: Sun Ra discography
See also[]
- Wavelength Infinity: A Sun Ra Tribute
- The American Composers Series
- "Daydream in Space"
External links and references[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Homer Flynn (interviewed by Sean Kitching), "The Strange World Of... The Residents - Homer Flynn Interviewed", The Quietus, February 9th 2016
- ↑ "They weren't really record collectors. They would go to thrift shops and buy records, and they liked, you know... Sun Ra and Led Zeppelin, so... upstairs there were like... about two thousand albums, and it was all... you know, people would say "really, it would be that?"... there would be Blue Öyster Cult or something... but you know, there was a bunch of Sun Ra too..." Tom Timony (interviewed by Nate Goyer), "Ep 137: Ralph Records with Tom Timony", The Vinyl Guide, September 10th 2018
- ↑ Jim Knipfel and Brian Poole, et al., Faceless Forever - A Residents Encyclopaedia, 2022, pg. 19
- ↑ "That'll Be the Day (Baby Baby)" liner notes, 2023