A Love Supreme

A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album by Ashley Kahn, 2002

I read this book about the making of one of my favorite albums over the summer of 2003. 

I was listening to this album recently and having an online discussion about it with a friend. That conversation reminded me of how much I enjoyed reading this book some eighteen years ago.

Ashely Kahn is an American music historian, journalist and producer and in 2001 I had read his previous book about Miles Davis and his making of Kind of Blue. They were both fantastic books. 

His book about the Coltrane album features interviews with over a hundred musicians, producers, friends and family members. You really got a sense of the process involved in the creation of this masterpiece. It was a great portrait of a genius and part biography and part musical analysis of a musician, a quartet and an era. It was the spiritual journey of a very talented person.

This album has always been one of my favorite records in my collection. I bought it around 1974 at Third Street Jazz in downtown Philadelphia. That record store was a special place for me and my exploration of jazz along with the Temple U radio station WRTI. I would also later get this album in CD and then an expanded CD version that included an extra disc of a live performance of the original music. I love everything about this album and could listen to it all day. I have. Definitely a desert island album.

My first album of his was Impressions and I would go on to have about 50 of his albums in my collection.