Alice Coltrane's Ashram Tapes set to be released

Alice Coltrane's four Ashram Tapes, recorded during the '80s and '90s, are set to be released via Matador Records.

The four albums Turiya Sings, Divine Songs, Infinite Chants, and Glorious Chants have never been available to the public in any format. Between the '80s and 2004, she only produced music for religious purposes and for the members of her ashram. The recordings blend elements of jazz, new age, gospel and electronic music.

A release date has not been announced.

The albums were originally distributed on cassette to members at the Sai Anantam Ashram, north of Los Angeles. The spiritual centre in the Santa Monica Mountains was founded by the performer, following the death of her husband and fellow jazz musician John Coltrane.

The centre was destroyed by the Woolsey wildfire in 2018.

Although the tapes have never been released to the public, several songs from Divine Songs, Infinite Chants, and Glorious Chants, were complied in 2017 on The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda, and an altered version of Turiya Sings was released in 2021, without synthesisers.

"Musically, it’s a pure reflection of the life journey my mother was on at the time," her daughter Michelle Coltrane writes.

"She was seeking, in every, most authentic way, a life of devotion, transcendence, and spiritual elevation.

"The profundity of Turiya Alice Coltrane’s musical offerings now being made publicly available is in alignment with a divine order, something Alice often spoke about," she added.

"Artists never stop creating.”

Alice Coltrane changed her name in 1975 to Alice Swamini Turiyasangitananda, which translates from Sanskrit to "the highest song of God". She returned to performing public concerts in 2006 before she passed away in 2007.