Rashied Ali Quintet

Drummer Rashied Ali began his playing career in the US Army, later returning to his native Philadelphia where he played in the R&B, rock, and jazz bands in the area including those of Big Maybelle, Jimmy Smith and Lee Morgan. In the early 60’s, he moved to NYC where he became a fixture on the burgeoning avant-garde scene playing with Don Cherry, Pahroah Sanders, Albert Ayler, Archie Shepp, Bill Dixon and many more. In 1965, he got the call from John Coltrane to join the group as a second drummer along with the great Elvin Jones but soon became the only drummer in Coltrane’s final, highly influential and controversial, revolutionary ensemble known for recordings such as Expression, Interstellar Space (duets with Trane) and Live at the Village Vanguard Again. They played together until Trane’s death in 1967. Rashied Ali is one of the fathers of free-jazz drumming and every free-jazz drummer (and to an extent, every free-jazz musician), who followed, owes him a debt. For the next 40 years after Trane’s death until the present, Rashied Ali has remained a vital and ever-expanding musician even opening and operating his own performance space— Ali’s Alley— in NYC for several years in the 1970’s. While known as an avant-gardist and someone who is still involved in that scene, Rashied Ali does it all. His current quintet harkens as much to the swinging post-bop work of Ali‘s teacher, Philly Joe Jones or to Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers as it does to the work of John Coltrane. Like Blakey, Ali has enlisted the talents of the younger players who have worked with him now for the last several years. Lawrence Clark, saxophone; Josh Evans, trumpet; Greg Murphy, piano; and Joris Teepi, bass.

$20/$15 Members. Available in advance, by phone or in person, at the Outpost Performance Space (268-0044)

The Rashied Ali Quintet will also appear in Santa Fe, Friday,
October 5 at 8 & 10pm at Evangelo’s Cocktail Lounge. (505)670-6482 for info; and in Truth or Consequences, Saturday, October 6 at 7pm at the T or C Senior Rec Center. (505)894-0528 for info.