The Magic City

Vinyl LP pressing. The Magic City is an album by the American jazz musician Sun Ra and his Solar Arkestra. Recorded in two sessions in 1965, the record was released on Ra's own Saturn label in 1966. It is part of the Penguin Guide's Core Collection of recommendations. It is notable especially for the title track, on which "the Arkestra's range of feelings and sound is expressed in a design that's simply unprecedented in jazz." While it begins with use of tape echo recalling the experiments on Art Forms of Dimensions Tomorrow, the key features quickly emerge: Ra's simultaneous piano and clavioline intertwining with Boykins's bass as the underpinning for new long-forms of group music-making which draw on varying sub-ensembles from the Arkestra through the course of the piece.