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  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      £1 GBP

     

  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    Celebrating 50 years of Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble’s legacy and unwavering contribution to Great Black Music. ‘Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit’ is a new Ethnic Heritage Ensemble sound, constantly shifting gears and tempos in a jazz-blues continuum, in perpetual spontaneity, combining their meaningful music history with an innovative approach to arrangements, performance and improvisation. This is Ancient / Future Music for the Now and Beyond.

    This is a special edition deluxe DBL LP 180g vinyl on gatefold jacket with obi.
    It is graced by Nep Sidhu’s tapestry ‘The Sound Sculpture Forms & Knowledge of Kahil El’Zabar’, a massive incredible piece of art - recently exhibited at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, that has been inspired by and dedicated to Kahil El Zabar.

    "The pursuit to collaborate and collect people’s experiences of merging into oneness through song, script or form has been a pluriversal pursuit in human potential since the early 1700s during the collection of said experiences for the Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji. These sets of exchanges personally carry on today by way of one's own participation as well as witness. InThe Sound Sculpture Forms & Knowledge Transfers of Kahil El’Zabar, the tapestry acts as a visual capture of both. By looking into Kahil El Zabar’s innovative musical vocabulary and approach to percussion, there is an eruption of interdependence through ancestry and ritual that shouts ‘The Time is Now!’ (Something he usually ends his phone conversations with when we speak). The percussion not only looks at Kahil’s own playing but further into the continuum of his teachers and peers who shared in a common conduction such as Kelan Phil Cohran, Muhal Richard Abrams, Malachi Favors and multiple other contributors to Great Black Music. The mapping of sounds is merged with the multitudes of listening through a Sikh understanding of melody to become one with it. In this sense, we see the iconography of swords, shastars and other weapons levitating in a dance of protection and exaltation. Here we see the true resonance of objects and materials take towards their own flight into a higher sound experience, beyond form, beyond shape. Spirit Music."
    - Nep Sidhu

    Includes unlimited streaming of Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ... more
    ships out within 3 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      £39 GBP

     

  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Celebrating 50 years of Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble’s legacy and unwavering contribution to Great Black Music. ‘Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit’ is a new Ethnic Heritage Ensemble sound, constantly shifting gears and tempos in a jazz-blues continuum, in perpetual spontaneity, combining their meaningful music history with an innovative approach to arrangements, performance and improvisation. This is Ancient / Future Music for the Now and Beyond.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 3 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      £14 GBP

     

  • Full Digital Discography

    Get all 3 Ethnic Heritage Ensemble releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit, Spirit Gatherer • Tribute to Don Cherry, and Be Known Ancient/Future/Music. , and , .

    Purchasable with gift card

      £21.75 GBP (25% OFF)

     

about

The Ethnic Heritage Ensemble (EHE) constantly shifts gears and tempos in a jazz-blues continuum, in perpetual spontaneity, and “Compared To What” is a powerful statement on their incomparable sound. It’s a deeply funky read of Eugene McDaniel’s eternal protest song first recorded by Robert Flack, and later, Les McCann and Eddie Harris. Featuring vocals and kalimba by El’Zabar, backed by bassist Alex Harding, the EHE’s “Compared To What” is 8 minutes of contemplative, dynamic rhythms  combined with El’Zabar’s deep captivating vocals, and accompanying horn and string cacophony that tunes  the listener to their higher consciousness. 

“Compared To What’ was my father, Clifton Blackburn Sr’s favorite tune,” says El’Zabar. “On Saturdays he would play jazz all day, and later in the evening, he would scat, sing rhythms, and then he and I would improvise together on the grooves that he taught me. It was all ‘Compared to What.’”

credits

from Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit, track released November 30, 2023
ETHNIC HERITAGE ENSEMBLE
Kahil El'Zabar - multi-percussion, voice
Corey Wilkes - trumpet, percussion
Alex Harding - baritone sax

Featuring:
James Sanders - violin, viola
Ishmael Ali - cello

Composition by Gene McDaniels
Arrangements by Kahil El’Zabar

Tapestry and Art Direction by Nep Sidhu

Recorded in Soundmine Studios, Chicago in July 2023
Recorded and Mixed by Dennis Tousana
Mastered and Cut by Frank Merritt at The Carvery, London

Videography by Christopher Andrew, Stoptime Live
Shot by Alex Brescanu and Christopher Andrew

Featuring Nep Sidhu's tapestry ‘The Sound Sculpture Forms & Knowledge of Kahil El’Zabar’
Tapestry photo by Without Shape Without Form

Spiritmuse Records
Music for the Spirit

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Ethnic Heritage Ensemble Chicago, Illinois

Celebrating an extraordinary 50 yrs of their unwavering contribution to Great Black Music, the Ethnic Heritage Ensemble, led by legendary Chicago multi-percussionist & composer Kahil El’Zabar (one of the leaders of spiritual jazz today), w/ Corey Wilkes on trumpet & Alex Harding on baritone sax, combine the history of EHE's music with an innovative approach that speaks to the now and beyond. ... more

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