Recorded in 1965, Hasaan Ibn Ali’s ‘Lost Atlantic Album’ has now been found!

Restored from long-lost acetate copies of the sessions, the album showcases the work of the jazz pianist, a contemporary and colleague of John Coltrane. Ali had practiced intensively with John Coltrane in the early 1950s and is thought to have been the influence behind Coltrane’s so-called sheets of sound. He is also partially credited for the harmonic approach that underlay Coltrane’s breakthrough ‘Giant Steps’ and, alongside Earl Bostic, is one of two role models behind Coltrane’s strict work ethic.

In 1964, drummer/composer Max Roach convinced Atlantic Records to record Ali with producer Nusuhi Ertegun at the helm. Sessions were held in December of 1964 and the resulting album, ‘The Max Roach Trio Featuring The Legendary Hasaan’ was released three months later. Atlantic invited Ali to record again the following year but, before mixing sessions could turn the recorded material into a releasable album, Ali was incarcerated on a narcotics possession. Atlantic shelved the album. Thirteen years later that tape went up in flames in an Atlantic Records warehouse in Long Branch, New Jersey. For years a rumour circulated that a copy of the sessions had been made, but attempts to locate it never turned up a source…until now.

Omnivore Recordings is proud to present this long-thought lost piece of jazz history. It was restored and mastered by Grammy Award-winning engineer Michael Graves from a tape copy of long-lost reference acetates of the sessions. Notes from producer Alan Sukoenig and author/pianist Lewis Porter add to the release.

“He had ideas as deep as the sea. I mean I never heard anybody, even today, play like that. The most advanced player to ever develop [in Philadelphia]” – Odean Pope, tenor saxophonist