Both Directions at Once New York Performances

“Both Directions at Once” revisits the 1963 studio sessions John Coltrane recorded with his Classic Quartet, material that disappeared for decades and resurfaced in 2018 as a document of a band in transition. At NJPAC, the music is reinterpreted by Joe Lovano, Melissa Aldana, Nduduzo Makhathini, John Patitucci, and Jeff Tain Watts, tracing Coltrane’s push between structure and open improvisation. In a New York jazz lineage shaped by Coltrane’s own working years in the city, this program reads as a living footnote. One clear takeaway is how unfinished ideas can still set the terms for the present.