The Max Roach Trio Featuring The Legendary Hasaan arrived in early 1965, and instantly became a jazz classic. Atlantic Records recorded Hasaan later that year, and the resulting album was shelved, and then thought lost, until it was restored from tape copies of acetates and issued nearly a half century later as Metaphysics: The Lost Atlantic Album. Metaphysics was a critical sensation, and furthered the legend and legacy of Hasaan’s innovative, exhilarating and inventive playing and songs.

Retrospect In Retirement Of Delay: The Solo Recordings, another collection of previously unissued performances, followed—promoting The New Yorker to say that it “…reveals his profundity, his overwhelming power, his mighty virtuosity. It does more than put him on the map of jazz history—it expands the map to include the vast expanse of his musical achievement.”

Now, Omnivore Recordings presents Reaching For The Stars: Trios / Duos / Solos featuring eleven more previously unissued recordings. The Trios feature Henry Grimes (Thelonious Monk, McCoy Tyner, Sonny Rollins) and Kalil Madi (Freddie McCoy, Mongo Santamaria—as well as Hasaan’s Metaphysics), performing six tracks (four of which appeared in their studio versions on The Max Roach Trio Featuring The Legendary Hasaan.) It also adds three songs with vocalist Muriel Gilliam, aka Muriel Winston, and a pair of solo portraits of the master pianist.

Produced for release by Grammy® award-winning producer Cheryl Pawelski and ASCAP award-winning writer Alan Sukoenig, Reaching For The Stars features a new essay from pianist, composer & writer, Ethan Iverson. As with the previous Omnivore Hasaan Ibn Ali releases, this collection has been painstakingly restored and mastered by Grammy® award-winning engineer Michael Graves.

This collection is another look into the previously unheard recordings of Hasaan Ibn Ali whose lost recorded work proves he was Reaching For The Stars and touching them all.

1. ALMOST LIKE ME
2. DINKA STREET
3. PAY NOT PLAY NOT (Take 1)
4. VICEROY
5. OFF MY BACK JACK
6. PER ASPERA AD ASTRA
7. STELLA BY STARLIGHT
8. EMBRACEABLE YOU
9. BODY AND SOUL
10. AFTER YOU’VE GONE (Long Version)
11. THE END OF A LOVE AFFAIR

This 11 previously unissued tracks from the rediscovered, legendary Hasaan Ibn opens on the jaunty ALMOST LIKE ME and the rhythmic DINKA STREET and then brings us the furtively structured PAY NOT PLAY NOT (Take 1), the forthright VICEROY and then comes the free flowing OFF MY BACK JACK.

Along next is the harder-edged piano work found within PER ASPERA AD ASTRA and the vocalized beauty STELLA BY STARLIGHT and they are in turn backed by the sumptuously vocalized EMBRACEABLE YOU, the impassioned, also vocalized BODY AND SOUL (all by vocalist Muriel Gilliam, aka Muriel Winston), the recording rounding out on the frenetic key work of AFTER YOU’VE GONE (Long Version), closing on the industrially-sculpted THE END OF A LOVE AFFAIR.

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