| Illuminators | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Live album by | ||||
| Released | 1996 | |||
| Venue | The Knitting Factory, New York City | |||
| Genre | Free jazz | |||
| Label | Audible Hiss 008 | |||
| Sunny Murray chronology | ||||
| ||||
Illuminators is a live album by drummer Sunny Murray. It was recorded at The Knitting Factory in New York City and was released in 1996 by Audible Hiss. On the album, Murray is joined by saxophonist and pianist Charles Gayle. [1]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [2] |
| The Penguin Guide to Jazz |  [3] |
In a review for AllMusic, Rob Ferrier wrote: "Sunny Murray and Charles Gayle... here engage in an intense musical discussion... While the mood can only be described as tense, these musicians pay careful attention to each other, not arguing so much as conversing. This music is dense but never crowded, and never ever directionless... Not many instrumentalists could keep up with Murray's volcano. In Gayle, Murray has found a voice to rival the visceral power he once grappled with in Ayler's band. To both musicians' credit, each seems content to flex their muscle rather than knock the listener about the head and shoulders with it." [2]
The authors of the Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings awarded the album 3½ stars, and commented: "The duo with Gayle was to provide some of the most ferociously beautiful live moments of the '90s. Inevitably, it transfers to record only with an overall loss of drive, but these five pieces... are as clear a representation of his art as one could hope for.... Murray still cleaves to a dark, punchy groove, the percussion equivalent of what Cecil Taylor was doing, but with more song in it." [3]
Track timings not provided.
James Marcellus Arthur "Sunny" Murray was an American musician, and was one of the pioneers of the free jazz style of drumming.
Charles Gayle is an American free jazz musician. Initially known as a saxophonist who came to prominence in the 1990s after decades of obscurity, Gayle also performs as pianist, bass clarinetist, bassist, and percussionist.
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Khan Jamal, born Warren Robert Cheeseboro, was an American jazz vibraphone and marimba player. He founded the band Sounds of Liberation in 1970. He was described by Ron Wynn as "a proficient soloist when playing free material, jazz-rock and fusion, hard bop, or bluesy fare."
It is in the Brewing Luminous is a live album by Cecil Taylor recorded at Fat Tuesdays, NYC, on February 8 & 9, 1980 and released on the Hat Hut label. The album features performances by Taylor with Jimmy Lyons, Ramsey Ameen, Alan Silva, Jerome Cooper and Sunny Murray. The album was originally released as a double LP then rereleased as a single CD.
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Live at Moers Festival is a live album by drummer Sunny Murray. It was recorded in June 1979 at the Moers Festival in Moers, Germany, and was released later that year by Moers Music. On the album, Murray is joined by saxophonist and bass clarinetist David Murray, and bassist Malachi Favors, and percussionist Cheikh Tidiane Fall.
Live at Glenn Miller Café is a live album by saxophonist Arthur Doyle and drummer Sunny Murray. It was recorded in March 2000 at the Glenn Miller Café in Stockholm, Sweden, and was released in 2001 by Ayler Records. Although the album is credited to Doyle and Murray, the first three tracks are a duet between Murray and saxophonist Bengt Frippe Nordström, who died several months after the concert.
Sonic Liberation Front Meets Sunny Murray is an album by the Philadelphia-based ensemble Sonic Liberation Front and drummer Sunny Murray. Three tracks on the album were recorded live in 2002, while the remaining tracks were recorded at Rittenhouse Recording Studio in 2008. The album was released in 2010 by the High Two label.
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