Shabaka, known for his work as the sax player and band leader of celebrated groups Sons of Kemet and The Comet Is Coming, has announced his new solo album, Perceive its Beauty, Acknowledge its Grace, out April 12 via Impulse!.
This new work finds Shabaka primarily focused on flutes and softer woodwinds, including first single “End of Innocence,” which features Shabaka on clarinet. The piece features contributions from Jason Moran (piano), Nasheet Waits (drums), and Carlos Niño (percussion), and its Phoebe Boswell-directed video features Shabaka moving fluidly while enveloped in water. Check it out below.
Additionally, Shabaka has announced a performance in Brooklyn, NY at National Sawdust on Tuesday, April 23. He will also be performing at Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, TN at the end of March. Of “End of Innocence,” and the album broadly, Shabaka said: “[It] really signifies a departure for me, a departure from the bands that I’ve become known for playing in, and the arrival of the flutes in general. I bring a lot of flutes to the album and explore different kind of sonic terrains, although for this track in particular, it’s not actually the flute, it’s the clarinet. It’s my first instrument, the instrument that I consider to be my primary instrument, so it’s really going back to what I feel most comfortable with.”
With contributions on the record from André 3000, Esperanza Spalding, Moses Sumney, Brandee Younger, Floating Points, Laraaji, Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, Saul Williams, Elucid, and more, Perceive its Beauty, Acknowledge its Grace is a grand artistic statement from Shabaka.
For the flute-forward album Perceive its Beauty, Acknowledge its Grace, Shabaka tapped into a remarkable cadre of players. “I invited a bunch of musicians I’ve met and admired over the past few years of touring throughout the United States to collaborate and everyone said yes, which I constantly find breathtaking,” he disclosed.
His aim was to gather the musicians at Rudy Van Gelder’s historic studios, which he says “informed the sound of so many seminal jazz albums that have shaped my musical aptitude. We played with no headphones or separation in the room so we could capture the atmosphere of simply playing together in the space without a technological intermediary.”
