Cosmic Therapy

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Cosmic Therapy

Bennett Theissen

The Chill Room , 10 May 2014 at 12:30am PDT on killradio.org. 256k, 73 minutes, Sun Ra in a collage, music from 1946-1972. This is as good an introduction to Ra's music and philosophy as you can find. In honor of the centennial of Sun Ra's birth (May 22, 2014), I have replayed this perfect Chill Room with a biography and a collage of some of Sun Ra's greatest music. This music really does have SPACE in it -- inner and outer, space for listening, space for thinking, space for dreaming, room for everyone to thrive and grow. This music also has both a sense of humor and of true beauty and is as mind boggling as it can be. And it will clear your head like nothing else. What I have done is collaged together about thirty of my favorite segments of Ra's music and it makes its own reality. Enjoy, learn and please leave a comment. All material unless otherwise noted by Sun Ra and His Arkestra.   Setlist: Space Is The Place / Introduction / Blues at Midnight / Wynonie Harris-Dig This Boogie (1946 Sonny wailing on piano) / Eugene Wright and His Dukes of Swing-Pork 'n' Beans (1948 Sonny wrote this) / The Cosmic Rays-Daddy Gonna Tell You No Lies (1954 Sonny produced and released this on a Saturn 45) / Street Named Hell / The Magic City / Door Squeak / Thither and Yon / Solar Drums / Rocket Number Nine Take Off for the Planet Venus / David Toop-Sun Ra's first London Show 1970 (from Ocean of Sound) / Cluster of Galaxies / Shadow World / Kosmos in Blue / Watusa / Walt Dickerson Quartet-Selina's Fantasy / Batman Theme / Satellites Are Spinning / Robin's Theme / Enlightenment (Helsinki 1971 live and 1959 studio) / Outer Spaceways Incorporated / Infinity of the Universe / Ancient Aiethiopia / Black Man / Love in Outer Space / Sun Ra and His Band from Outer Space / Concrete Poem of Arkestra Names / Space Loneliness / The Overseer / Calling Planet Earth / Space is The Place Material is taken from the following albums:  Jazz by Sun Ra (aka Sun song) 1956 / Jazz in Silhouette 1958 / Rocket Number Nine Take Off for the Planet Venus (aka Interstellar Low Ways) 1959 / Art Forms of Dimensions Tomorrow 1961 / Cosmic Tones for Mental Therapy 1963 / The Magic City 1965 / Walt Dickerson Quartet-Impressions of a Patch of Blue 1965 / Strange Strings 1965 / The Sensational Guitars of Dan and Dale-Batman and Robin 1966 / Nothing Is 1966 / Helsinki 1971 The Complete Concert and Interview / Soundtrack to the Film Space Is The Place 1972.  Dates are for when sessions were recorded. Biographical information from John Szwed.  Special thanks to wfmu.org, my listeners (who stayed with me even when the first attempt at this show glitched out and it had to be redone), and to Michael Sheppard. In this program I state that the music peaked in 1972 or so, and while I think this is still basically correct, there was a LOT of great music between 1973 and 1993. Salut, Sonny, you really were One of the Gods. Originally mixed live on killradio.org on March 10, 2010. Remastered 2023. May this program change the planet. The sound of joy is enlightenment. Space fire truth is enlightenment. Space fire, sometimes it's music, strange mathematics, rhythmic equations. Hereby, my invitation, I do invite you to be of my space world.