This extraordinary album, which was reissued on the occasion of our thirty years of activity, is a tribute to the great Trinidadian pianist Sonnie Taylor, who in these recordings, accompanied by singer Shirley Bunnie Foy and percussionist Anthony Ange Franzino, expresses all his musical nature connected to Africa and the spiritual roots of jazz music.

As we’ve had a close relationship with Sonnie since the early 90s (many will remember our reissue of Mayafra Combo's self-titled album on Right Tempo Classics), this project also brought us very much back to our own roots, right when we started.

It is worth noting that this LP came out together with our second-ever book, titled 'From Slavery to Jazz', written by Sonnie in the late 70s and previously unreleased. This was born from a series of conferences Sonnie held at Olivetti fabric in Ivrea, which had the aim of allowing the more sensitive public to deepen their knowledge of the music and history of the African-American people. The book is edited in Italian and English and is a powerful, yet direct and simple, historic testimony of the African-American music and culture “from slavery to Bitches Brew”, narrated from the eyes of a Black musician living in the North of Italy in the 70s.

It should also be noted that as the reels of these sessions are no longer available, we were forced to master from the original vinyl, trying to find the right compromise between sound quality and background noise cancellation, remaining at the same time faithful to the original sound of the recording. We believe the result exceeds in quality the original pressing and we hope it will meet the expectations of our most meticulous fans.

We would like to conclude by thanking Elsa and Maya Taylor – Sonnie’s wife and daughter - for giving us the opportunity to celebrate our thirtieth birthday with Sonnie Taylor's significant art.