BY ZO • MARCH 23 2019

Though he slipped into stardust almost 30 years ago, Sun Ra‘s catalog has been growing by the month.

Earlier this year, a pair of previously unreleased albums, Pathways to Unknown Worlds and Monorails and Satellites, landed like anvils launched from one of Saturn’s rings. And this week, another collection of long-dormant material has made its way. Only this time, it’s just the Arkestral conductor and some ivory.

Performed at Columbia University’s legendary WKCR in 1977 (well before Stretch and Bobbito got their hands on the programming,) Solo Piano offers a rare glimpse at a paired-down Sun sans massive ensemble and/or electronics. Save for a few vocal embellishments from John Gilmore and June Tyson in the background, it is one of the only known recordings of Sun all by his lonesome on an analog piano (his first instrument,) from this period of his career.

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