Tag Archives: Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble

Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble releases second single ‘Return of the Lost Tribe’

24 January 2024

The monumental feat that is Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble‘s 50th anniversary is something worth celebrating and they´re doing that with a special new album titled Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit. The record arrives on March 8th through Spiritmuse Records and they had already teased it with lead single ‘Compared To What’. As if we needed more reasons to be excited, Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble  have shared a second exhilarating single called ‘Return of the Lost Tribe’, composed by El’Zabar in the 90s and originally recorded in the 2000s by a group of Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians leaders, including El’Zabar, Malachi Favors, Joseph Jarman, Kalaparusha Maurice Mcyntyer, and Adegoke Steve Colson. El’Zabar comments:

“The music intends to convey that something powerful and inspired is returning, or coming around again with inspired vigor and wisdom. I feel deep inside me that we are all connected with energies of refined frequency. Each of us possesses the ability to tap into ageless energy which can restore and make us fresh. ‘Return of The Lost Tribe’ speaks to the remembrance of glory that will come again in the present, once we acquire the knowledge to tap into it.”

‘Return of the Lost Tribe’ is offered with a video and you watch it below.

Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble announce 50th anniversary album, Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit

05 December 2023

Photo: Christopher Andrew

In celebration of Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble‘s milestone 50th anniversary, Spiritmuse Records has a special release from them on the way. On March 8th, they’ll release a new album titled Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit, described as “a visionary journey into deep roots and future routes, channeling traditions old and new”. The record features originals like ‘Barundi’, ‘Hang Tuff’, ‘Ornette’ ,and ‘Great Black Music’ as well as other modern compositions which El’Zabar arranged, including an interpretation of Miles Davis’ ‘All Blues’.

Alongside the news, Kahil El’Zabar’s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble are giving us the first phenomenal taste from the album in the shape of lead single ‘Compared To What’, a protest song originally written by Eugene McDaniel which was first recorded by Robert Flack in 1969, and later, Les McCann and Eddie Harris. Of the track, El’Zabar says:

“Compared To What’ was my father, Clifton Blackburn Sr’s favourite tune. 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.’”

‘Compared To What’ comes with an accompanying video and you can watch it below.