Evenings At The Village Gate
IMPULSE
10/10
THE April 1962 cover of Down Beat, the leading jazz magazine in the US, presented stark black-and-white charcoal sketches of two musicians alongside an equally bold headline: JOHN COLTRANE AND ERIC DOLPHY ANSWER THE JAZZ CRITICS. Inside, the pair responded to accusations that the music they were making together represented “an anarchistic course… that can but be termed anti-jazz”, according to one of the magazine’s writers.
“Music is a reflection of everything – and it’s universal,” Coltrane replied, inviting scorn from the scepticsthe music as a vehicle for the quest for spiritual enlightenment.
