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The Cosmobiography of Sun Ra: The Sound of Joy Is Enlightening

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The Cosmobiography of Sun Ra: The Sound of Joy Is Enlightening

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Overview

Caldecott Medalist Chris Raschka shares his love of jazz great Sun Ra, just in time to mark the centennial of the musician’s birth.

Jazz musician Sun Ra (1914–1993) always said that he came from Saturn. Being from another planet, he was naturally intrigued by everything earthly — especially music, because music is the one thing on Earth most like the stars. Earthlings themselves confused Sun Ra, the way they sorted themselves by color and fought wars against one another. So he made music. And he traveled with other musicians and singers, calling themselves the Sun Ra Arkestra, playing, singing, and dancing for people all over the planet. Because music, he said, is what holds us all together. Join acclaimed author-illustrator Chris Raschka in celebrating a legend of the jazz world who was truly one of a kind.

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About the Author

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780763658069
Publisher:	Candlewick Press
Publication date:	05/13/2014
Pages:	40
Product dimensions:	8.25(w) x 8.88(h) x 0.35(d)
Lexile:	1000L (what's this?)
Age Range:	6 - 9 Years

About the Author

Chris Raschka has received the Caldecott Medal twice, for The Hello, Goodbye Window by Norman Juster and for A Ball for Daisy, which he wrote and illustrated. He is the acclaimed illustrator of many books for children, including the Caldecott Honor Book Yo! Yes?; I Pledge Allegiance by Bill Martin Jr. and Michael Sampson; Dylan Thomas’s A Child’s Christmas in Wales; The Grasshopper’s Song by Nikki Giovanni; and A Poke in the I, A Kick in the Head, and A Foot in the Mouth, all edited by Paul B. Janeczko. Chris Raschka lives in New York City.

From the B&N Reads Blog

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Editorial Reviews

03/03/2014
For jazz fans who welcomed Mysterious Thelonious and John Coltrane’s Giant Steps, Raschka profiles the uncategorizable musician Sun Ra. One century ago, in 1914, “Sun Ra landed on Earth. Looking around, he found himself in Birmingham, Alabama.” Claiming to be from Saturn and mystified by terrestrial customs, young Herman (Sonny) Blount invented a new name, learned to compose all manner of music, and traveled the U.S. performing and absorbing musical cultures. Raschka pictures Sun Ra and his Arkestra orchestra in chromatic gouache daubs and silhouette-black lowlights, bringing to mind Romare Bearden’s sultry palette and mellifluous collages. Raschka acknowledges the social and musical influences on the innovative artist, noting Sun Ra’s surprise that the “earthlings insisted on sorting themselves into two varieties: the white variety and the black variety” and Sun Ra’s conscientious objector stance during WWII (curiously, Raschka mentions Sun Ra’s love of Egypt, but never the sun god Ra). Although Raschka cannot fully convey “the sound of joy” in a silent picture book, he provides a selective list of recordings, encouraging readers to consider Sun Ra’s nonconformity and genius alongside a first listen to his polyphonic music. Ages 6–9. (May)

Publishers Weekly

This tribute to the innovative jazz keyboardist and band leader synthesizes brilliant paintings with a narrative that strikes just the right chords for its audience. ... Incorporating musical notation sheets into luminous watercolor-and-ink pictures, Raschka repeats their horizontal lines in piano strings, library bookshelves, city blocks and the very rectangularity of many compositions. The joyful palette—yellow, red, blue-green, sienna—and wildly gestural black ink celebrate Sun Ra’s unique spirit. Unequivocally stellar.
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

A fantastical tribute. ... This is not the first time Raschka has captured jazz in imagery, and here his trademark loose gestural style is especially effective in reflecting both the subject’s untethered spirit and impenetrable persona. The images themselves are dense and dynamic, painted on a variety of textured papers and musical notation sheets and full of brilliant color and heavy black. ... In the end, readers get a bright, impressionistic portrait that follows its subject’s refusal to play by the rules.
—The Horn Book

Raschka’s chief metaphor is a rich one: Sun Ra (born Herman P. Blount) fancied himself as Saturn born, and thus his quizzical questioning of the world is depicted extraterrestrially... As an experience... [this book] definitely swings.
—Booklist

Raschka pictures Sun Ra and his Arkestra orchestra in chromatic gouache daubs and silhouette-black lowlights, bringing to mind Romare Bearden’s sultry palette and mellifluous collages. Raschka acknowledges the social and musical influences on the innovative artist... [and] provides a selective list of recordings, encouraging readers to consider Sun Ra’s nonconformity and genius alongside a first listen to his polyphonic music.
—Publishers Weekly

Highlighting Sun Ra's peculiar claim of origin is a wonderful way to capture the openhearted weirdness of the musically precocious Herman P. Blount... Mr. Raschka's messy, moody, exuberant watercolors look like Sun Ra's music transformed into paint—a gloriously cacophonous unity of subject matter, text and illustration.
—The Wall Street Journal

[An] inventive opening scene of a roughly outlined Sun Ra crashing down to Earth and a few views of the full Arkestra in their dazzling garb... [V]iewers find cityscapes and contemporary musicians, which are skillfully rendered in Raschka’s signature explosion of thick, freewheeling line and splashes of vibrant watercolor...
—Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

The idea of a picture-book biography of out-there jazzman Sun Ra for kids is a delight. ... Raschka's colorful, impressionistic illustrations are like bits of jazz on the page.
—The New York Post

Superb.
—Philadelphia Inquirer

From the Publisher

★ 04/01/2014
Gr 3–6—Raschka's proven ability to convey in words and images the musical essence of composers or traditions as diverse as Sergei Prokofiev, John Coltrane, and Shaker hymnody now extends to the avant-garde jazz of Herman "Sonny" Blount. Carefully selected details respect subject and audience: "Sun Ra always said that he came from Saturn. Now, you and I know that this is silly…. And yet. If he did…it would explain so much. Let's say he did…." Readers learn that this "intergalactic boulevardier" was born in Birmingham, had an early aptitude for music, and enjoyed reading about philosophy. They discover his views on race and war, meet the "Arkestra," and follow his global footprints. It is the art, however, that transmits the showman's spirit and eclectic sound that featured big band elements, synthesizers, improvisation, and percussion. Raschka pulls out all the stops in what may be his finest work yet. Strong, black outlines define richly layered, multi-hued watercolors. The artist captures both the focused intensity of a composer's face in an intimate close-up and the verve of a musician playing through celestial cityscapes. Wet and dry brush strokes create a lively but fluid dynamic, while stars and motion lines electrify. Musical composition paper is cleverly integrated into particular page designs, including the cover, in which the musician, arrayed in his dazzling robe, is one with the staff and hand-lettered title. Endpapers display album titles; a selected discography is available. Pull up a YouTube recording, and enchant a new generation with this ode to transcendental joy.—Wendy Lukehart, District of Columbia Public Library

School Library Journal

★ 2014-03-03
This tribute to the innovative jazz keyboardist and band leader synthesizes brilliant paintings with a narrative that strikes just the right chords for its audience. Born Herman Blount, aka Sonny, Sun Ra was an adept pianist by age 11 and gigging as an Alabama teen. A conscientious objector during World War II, Sun Ra thereafter dove into Chicago's vibrant jazz and blues scene. He and his band, the Arkestra, moved to New York in the 1960s, baffling some but pleasing jazz giants like Monk and Dizzy. Later based in Philadelphia, Sun Ra and company traveled the globe. Raschka respectfully embeds Sun Ra's iconoclastic philosophical perspective into the narrative, adopting a playfully conspiratorial tone: "Sun Ra always said that he came from Saturn. / Now, you know and I know that this is silly…. / And yet. / If he did come from Saturn, it would explain so much. / Let's say he did come from Saturn." Raschka likens the Arkestra to sailors bound for "a new world of sound" and calls their sleep-averse, bookstore-roaming leader "an intergalactic boulevardier." Incorporating musical notation sheets into luminous watercolor-and-ink pictures, Raschka repeats their horizontal lines in piano strings, library bookshelves, city blocks and the very rectangularity of many compositions. The joyful palette—yellow, red, blue-green, sienna—and wildly gestural black ink celebrate Sun Ra's unique spirit. Unequivocally stellar. (biographical note, selected discography in both aftermatter and on illuminated endpapers) (Picture book/biography. 6-9)

Kirkus Reviews

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