Pharoah Sanders

Pharoah Sanders is a US jazz saxophonist from Little Rock, Arkansas. Born Farrell Sanders in 1940 and active until his death in 2022, he begins his professional career on tenor saxophone in Oakland, California before moving to New York City in 1962.

Career

Sanders receives the nickname “Pharoah” from Sun Ra, with whom he performs. He comes to prominence in 1965 through work with John Coltrane’s band, during a period when Coltrane is exploring music that becomes known as avant-garde jazz. Sanders develops a style distinct from Coltrane’s, but remains strongly shaped by that collaboration. He is also influenced by Coltrane’s earlier work, especially A Love Supreme, and the spiritual chanting associated with that album later appears in Sanders’s own music.

He also works in free jazz, drawing on his collaborations with Coltrane, including Ascension and the dual-tenor recording Meditations. In 1968 he appears on Mike Mantler and Carla Bley’s JCOA: Jazz Composer’s Orchestra Association album Communications, alongside Cecil Taylor, Don Cherry, Larry Coryell and Gato Barbieri. His solo on that recording is described as especially intense and influential.

Later work and collaborations

In the 1970s, Sanders pursues his own recordings and continues to work with Alice Coltrane, including on Journey in Satchidananda. In 1994 he travels to Morocco to record with Gnawa master Maleem Mahmoud Ghania, resulting in The Trance of Seven Colours, produced by Bill Laswell. He continues to collaborate with Laswell, Jah Wobble and others on Message from Home and Save Our Children.

Style

Sanders is known for overblowing, harmonic and multiphonic saxophone techniques, as well as for using “sheets of sound”. His work spans avant-garde jazz, free jazz, blues, cool jazz, hard bop and gnawa.

Associated groups and labels

He is associated with the Pharoah Sanders Quintet, Pharoah Sanders Quartet, Ed Kelly & Friend, and the Elvin Jones McCoy Tyner Quintet. His labels include Ferrell Sanders Music Inc. and Pharoah Sanders Music.