Sun Ra

  Sam Records continues its essential reissue series of Transition Records' visionary catalog with Jazz By Sun Ra Vol. 2, the companion piece to Sun Ra's landmark 1957 Jazz by Sun Ra Vol. 1. Originally intended as Transition TRLP-28 but left unreleased when the label folded, these recordings remained in limbo until Bob Koester rescued them for Delmark in 1968 as Sound of Joy [DS-414]. Now, over half a century later, this crucial document of the Arkestra in full flight receives the treatment it has always deserved.

Recorded during the same fertile period as Vol. 1—with sessions at Universal Recording in Chicago in July 1957—Jazz By Sun Ra Vol. 2 captures Sun Ra and his expanded eleven-piece Arkestra pushing even further into uncharted sonic territory. Where Vol. 1 offered accessibility, Vol. 2 reveals the raw experimental edge that would come to define Sun Ra's cosmic vision. The addition of Dave Young (tp), James Scales (as), and Richard Davis (b) to core members Pat Patrick, John Gilmore, Robert Barry, and Jim Herndon creates a density and complexity that anticipates the free jazz revolution by several years.

What distinguishes Jazz By Sun Ra Vol. 2 is its daring balance between structure and liberation. Sun Ra's mathematical approach to harmony and rhythm—those "harmonic scales based on his mathematical equations"—is here deployed with even greater boldness. The arrangements shimmer with an otherworldly sophistication, yet within them lies space for collective improvisation and spiritual expression that points directly toward the modal and free innovations John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman would pioneer in the years immediately following.

These are not merely historical artifacts but living, breathing documents of a visionary artist operating at the height of his powers. The production quality, courtesy of Tom Wilson's resources and Universal Recording's facilities, captures every nuance of the Arkestra's sound with a clarity rarely afforded to Sun Ra's Saturn releases of the period. Each instrument occupies its own sonic space while contributing to a unified cosmic whole.

For those who know Sun Ra only through his later, more abstract explorations, Jazz By Sun Ra Vol. 2 offers revelation: here is an artist who never abandoned melody, swing, or beauty even as he reached toward the stars. The interplay between tradition and innovation, between Earth and cosmos, between discipline and freedom—all the dualities that would define Sun Ra's half-century career—are already fully present in these 1957 recordings.

Our reissue honors the album's phantom Transition heritage by employing silver-toned screen printing reminiscent of TRLP-10's original cover art—a visual echo of what might have been had Transition survived to release this masterpiece in its proper moment. Instead, we offer it now: a window into the moment when modern jazz began its journey beyond the known universe, guided by Sun Ra's singular vision of sound as both ancient ritual and futuristic prophecy.

Jazz By Sun Ra Vol. 2 stands alongside its companion volume as essential listening—not just for Sun Ra completists, but for anyone seeking to understand how jazz transformed from bebop sophistication into something stranger, freer, and infinitely more cosmic.