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Con Alma

Well, Herschel may be going blind but it seems that just as one observatory gets ready to close its eyes on the Universe, another one gets ready to open them. Yesterday saw the official opening of the Atacama Large Millimetre Array (known to its friends as ALMA). What better way to celebrate the opening of this remarkable observatory than with an appropriately-named piece of music.

Con Alma is an original composition by Dizzy Gillespie who plays it on this track made with his big band in 1954, a period when Dizzy was experimenting with various fusions of bebop with Latin-American rhythms. It’s a deceptively complicated tune, with lots of changes of key to keep everyone on their toes. It may be more Cuban than Chilean in influence, but that’s the closest I could think of!

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This entry was posted on March 14, 2013 at 4:17 pm and is filed under Jazz, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “Con Alma”

  1. Jim Geach Says:
    March 14, 2013 at 4:27 pm

    I know it’s not in keeping with the jazz theme, but may I also suggest this appropriate tune? http://youtu.be/C_pfMoUVNPw

    Reply
  2. telescoper Says:
    March 14, 2013 at 5:06 pm

    Or indeed this one:

    Reply

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