On a roll: Colrane and his quartet make a joyful sound on Crescent.
The poet and author Leroi Jones once wrote that John Coltrane's music "is one of the reasons suicide seems so boring." And it's hard to argue. Ecstactic yet world-weary, technically masterful yet deeply soulful, rooted in divine faith but never complacently so, Trane's music trod a hard road to transcendence. That musical spirit quest reached its apotheosis in his 1964 masterwork, A Love Supreme, as powerful a personal statement as has ever been recorded.
However, earlier that same year, the prolific saxophonist and his bandmates had laid down the tracks for an album that set the stage for A Love Supreme. Recorded in sessions on April 27 and June 1, Crescent ranks among one of the Coltrane quartet's most enjoyable albums.
Pianist McCoy Tyner and drummer Elvin Jones, members of Coltrane's quartet who participated in the recording — and both of whom are now gone — rated it among their favorites. "I always like Crescent, for entertainment," the drummer told author Ashley Kahn in his indispensable book A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album. "A Love Supreme is always more [of a] spiritual experience."
Trane, pianist McCoy Tyner, Garrison and Jones had been playing as a unit for three years at this point, and they sound completely relaxed and confident as they work through Coltrane's program of original songs. In fact, Crescent also represented Coltrane's first all-original album on the Impulse! label and, as Kahn points out, the saxophonist's first real conceptual work discounting recordings such as his duet album with singer Johnny Hartman and his Ballads record. (If you want to make out to Trane, start with these.)
The leader's bluesy, warm-toned tenor sets the mood on the gentle, opening title track, as his bandmates add sensitive rhythmic shadings and counterpoint. Of course, this being Coltrane, the tune expands beyond simple lights-low romance, and Trane lets loose with one of his typically probing solos before returning to the gorgeous melody. "The Wise One" continues in a similar mood, before the group dips into the hard-bop theme of "Bessie's Blues" and then the sweet, almost lullabylike "Lonnie's Lament." The record concludes with "The Drum Thing," a showcase for the virtuousic Jones, who opens the tune with his distant-thunder mallet rumble, and the track contains some absolutely lovely playing from Coltrane in duet with the drummer.
There's a calm at the center of Crescent that Coltrane rarely evinced in his later, more-turbulent and determinedly avant-garde work. Although A Love Supreme certainly had moments of wondrous beauty, Crescent possesses a certain air of quietude and elegant, melodic simplicity. At the time, Coltrane was living with Alice McLeod (the future Alice Coltrane), and she was expecting their first child. According to Kahn's book, the saxophonist was writing poems to Alice, and had begun to use language as a catalyst for ideas and rhythms within his compositions. Pianist Tyner relates that Trane had written his stunning ballad "Alabama" (included on the 1963 album Coltrane Live at Birdland) based on the cadences of a Martin Luther King Jr. speech delivered after four little girls were killed in a bombing. Coltrane admitted that "Wise One," "Lonnie's Lament" and "The Drum Thing" were all based on verse.
As for the Crescent title, a facile reading suggests that the half-moon shape represents Islam. A student of all religions, Coltrane reportedly became a Muslim after he kicked heroin in 1957, but apparently didn't stick with it. (A piece on his 1963 recording To the Beat of a Different Drum is titled "After the Crescent.") In the liners to A Love Supreme, Trane, the grandson of a Methodist minister, eschews any particular denomination or religious leanings in favor of something more universal, an unambiguous, all-encompassing shout-out to the Almighty.
"During the year 1957, I experienced, by the grace of God, a spiritual awakening which was to lead me to a richer, fuller, more productive life," he wrote, describing his renewed dedication to God and craft after harrowing battle with addiction. "At that time, in gratitude, I humbly asked to be given the means and privilege to make others happy through music."
And he certainly did just that with Crescent, one of his most joyous outings.
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