sun ra on earth and back again: two botch tapes from 1982.

did you ever wonder why the tapeography of the saturn net describes the two tapes "sun ra on earth" and "sun ra live in berlin" as "poorly edited private recordings with poor sound"? here you can hear that they are absolutely right. even hardcore collectors and obsessive completists might not listen to them more often than once or thrice. i bought them in the early eighties directly from the source and i spent a lot of money on them. so these are rather lousy first generation copies for your pleasure anyway.

both tapes probably were recorded in west berlin on the 22nd or/23rd of july 1982, though an other source claims "sun ra live in berlin" to have been recorded on the 24th of july 1982 in mannheim. both tapes probably are starring and featuring the arkestra with sun ra on piano, synthesizer and vocals; ronnie brown on trumpet; longinieu parsons on trumpet; tyrone hill on trombone; marshall allenon altosax, flute, kora and percussion; john gilmoreon tenorsax, clarinette, percussion and vocals; eloe omoe on altosax and bassclarinette; james jacson on bassoon, flute and ancient egyptian infinity drum; danny ray thompsonon baritonsax; hayes burnett on bass; eric "samurai" walker on drums; tommy hunter on drums; clifford jarvis on drums; june tyson singing and beverley parsons, carla washington and greg pratt dancing on stage and through the audience.

the sun ra tapeography 1981-1985 is keeping and providing additional information on both tapes. you will find them listed as "T82.7.22. Sun Ra on Earth" and "T82.7.23. Sun Ra Live in Berlin". the music is ripped with very old and appropriate equipment from tape and compressed to mp3 with 192 kbps. the tracks are about 30 minutes each.

sun ra on earth a
sun ra on earth b
sun ra live in berlin a
sun ra live in berlin b

alternate download

sun ra on earth: (click on pictures to enlarge)



berlin:

and as a bonus track (for the chosen few who scrolled down here:) here is a recording dating from the 18th of august 1933. sun ra was 18 years old then and he is not even rumoured to have played on it but it seems to be proven that he co-authored and arranged the tune. you can here clarence williams on piano, ed allen on cornet, cecil scott on clarinette and floyd casey on washboard:

clarence williams - chocolate avenue (vocalion 2584)