Sun Ra's "Astro Black Mythology". Narrating the Self

Seminar paper from the year 2014 in the subject Communications - Miscellaneous, grade: 1,0, University of Potsdam (Institut für Künste und Medien), language: English, abstract: As a ground-breaking pioneer of African-American experimental jazz, bandleader, composer and extraordinary visionary of his time, Sun Ra not only challenged contemporary musical theory, but also created a multi-layered and equally perplexing alternative universe whose mythology and intergalactic narrative navigated between ancient Egypt and outer space. Declaring himself “a brother from another planet” (essay title of John Corbett, 1994) namely from Saturn, not from planet Earth, Sun Ra cheerfully embraced the impossible – announcing in the 1960s that it attracted him because “everything possible has been done and the world did not change” (both cited in Lock 1999, 3) – and spent the rest of his life travelling the space ways, “from planet to planet” not only promoting but enacting a vision of a future utopia: “The impossible is the watchword of the greater space age. The space age cannot be avoided and the space music is the key to understand the meaning of the impossible and every other enigma” (cited in Lock 1999, 26).