KCOU JAZZ
Sept. 7, 2025
A journey through the rainbow of jazz music, drawing colors and textures from contemporary and archived sources.
Songs Included
Pharoah Sanders | Colors | Karma (1969)
On Colors, Pharoah Sanders cultivates a rainbow of musical textures, incorporating bright ringing bells over a bed of plunging, burrowing bass, filling the space between with muted horns, drawn out orchestral instruments. Meditative in his approach, Sanders explores the colors that surround him, first through his saxophone and then vocally, appreciating mother nature what she has brought. Through red and orange and purple, yellow and green, Sanders’ journey is a pensive one full of soul and trust.
Miles Davis | Blue in Green | Kind of Blue (1959)
Tapping into the coolest tones, Miles Davis explores blue and green hues in minor fashion on Kind of Blue’s closing A-side track. Tracing under Bill Evan’s blossoming chords like a skater cutting snow on an ice rink, Davis fashions a delicate, patient melody. When Davis bows out, Evans leaps between musical registers and left-hand overlaps to build towards John Coltranes resolute entrance.
When Coltrane does enter, it is one of the finest moments in jazz history. The three musicians combine in perfect harmony and drift into a free-flowing exploration of impressionist musical mood. The 10-bar melody is longing, leading the piece into a circular motion. As Davis concludes his final phrases, Evans’ circle becomes a spiral, crashing in on itself to seal the ephemeral moment.
Duke Ellington | Midnight Indigo | Anatomy of a Murder (1959)
Opening and closing with Billy Strayhorn’s discordant celeste, Midnight Indigo settles into a melancholic saxophone groove, where Harry Carney’s baritone pad taps and tired inhales are heard over gentle percussion. A product of Ellington’s soundtrack for Anatomy of A Murder, Midnight Indigo explores the color of the darkest sky.Jutta Hipp, Zoot Sims | Violets For Your Furs (1957)
From the artists’ joint album, Violets For Your Furs explores the final stretch of dark and pensive colors. A brilliant ballad engineered by Hipp’s harmonic piano and Sims’ flowing saxophone, this take on the American standard unfurls like a conversation. Flowery and full-bodied, violet emerges from the musicians’ warm hands.
Freddie Hubbard | Red Clay (1970)
A statement piece, Freddie Hubbard’s Red Clay soars into the fusion stratosphere, shattering conventions with open forms, electric bass, driving percussion, and trilling trumpet. Red Clay stands as Hubbard’s explorative masterpiece, becoming an album that would redefine jazz for the decade ahead. Balancing hard bop elements of the 1960s with new, freer elemnts, Red Clay brilliantly frames the bright hues of jazz music’s more avant-garde and envelope-pushing sound.Incorporating the talents of some of the most influential and prolific artists the genre, Hubbard is joined by Herbie Hancock on keys, Ron Carter on bass, Joe Henderson on saxophone, and Lenny White on drums.