John McLaughlin - Original Album Classics - 5CD-BOX 2007

This second box in Sony's German Original Album Classics series focuses on ve titles from John
McLaughlin's solo years immediately following the breakup of the Mahavishnu Orchestra.
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John McLaughlin became absorbed in his acoustic playing with his Indian classical music based group
Shakti (energy). McLaughlin had already been studying Indian classical music and playing the veena for
several years. The group featured Lakshminarayanan L. Shankar (violin), Zakir Hussain (tabla),
Thetakudi Harihara Vinayakram (ghatam) and earlier Ramnad Raghavan (mridangam). The group
recorded three albums; 'A Handful of Beauty' (1977), 'Shakti' (1976), and 'Natural Elements' (1977).
Based on both Carnatic and Hindustani styles, along with extended use of konnakol, the band introduced
ragas and Indian percussion to many jazz acionados.
In this group McLaughlin played a custom-made steel-string acoustic guitar made by Abe Wechter and
the Gibson guitar company that featured two tiers of strings over the soundhole: a conventional six-string
conguration and seven strings strung underneath at a forty-ve degree angle - these were independently
tuneable 'sympathetic strings' much like those on a sitar or veena. The instrument's vina-like scalloped
fretboard enabled McLaughlin to bend strings far beyond the reach of a conventional fretboard.
McLaughlin grew so accustomed to the freedom it provided him that he had the fretboard scalloped on his
Gibson Byrdland electric guitar. (wikipedia)
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John McLaughlin - Original Album Classics 1976-1979
(5CD Columbia, Sony, BMG 2007)
CD1 Shakti - Shakti 1976
CD2 Shakti - A Handful of Beauty 1977
CD3 Shakti - Natural Elements 1977
CD4 John McLaughlin - Electric Guitarist 1978
CD5 John McLaughlin - Electric Dreams 1979