Audiopile Review: Though he was, by all accounts, an extremely modest fellow, saxophonist Pharoah Sanders was also undoubtedly a titan of spiritual jazz. At the time of his passing in 2022, interest in Pharoah’s work had arguably never been higher. This was partly due to ‘Promises’, his acclaimed 2021 collaboration with Floating Points. And it was partly due to his association with the great Alice Coltrane. But surely the biggest factors were his instrumental mastery and unerring commitment to spiritually enriching music. Since Sanders departed this realm, reissue labels have been shining their lights into all sorts of forgotten corners of his discography. All very worthwhile, but maybe not the best places for new listeners to get started. So: where to begin? Any of the albums Sanders made for Impulse! during the late 60s and early 70s would do the trick, nicely. But for our money, 1971’s ‘Thembi’ is thee one. The dreamy, spiritual vibe is set early with keyboardist Lonnie Liston Smith’s ‘Astral Travelling’. But track two, ‘Red, Black & Green’, gets deep into some truly ferocious free blowing. It’s an important reminder that 1970s spiritual and ambient jazz emerged from the fiery furnace of The New Music. But even at its most extreme, ‘Thembi’ is a humane and healing journey through the cosmos. And with this new 180g edition, mastered at Third Man, you’ll be travelling in first class.

Released in 1971 on Impulse and recorded with two different ensembles, Thembi  marked a departure from the slowly developing, side-long, mantra-like grooves Sanders had been pursuing for much of his solo career. Instead, it offers an intriguingly wide range of relatively concise ideas resulting in something of an anomaly in Sanders’ prime period. Verve By Request Series features 180-gram vinyl, pressed at Third Man in Detroit.