Jean-Luc Ponty-Upon The Wings Of Music (1975)

In the mid-1970s, French musician Jean-Luc Ponty signed with the prestigious Atlantic Records label and released his first album under that label, the ninth of his solo career. Although Ponty was still a member of the Mahavishnu Orchestra at the time, he decided to definitively launch his solo career by composing his first fully electric work. Accompanied by a group of American musicians, including guitarist Dan Sawyer, keyboardist Patrice Rushen, and bassist Ralph Armstrong, this debut already hinted at the distinctive jazz fusion/rock style that would soon make him world-famous, even though his reputation preceded him, having played with bands like the aforementioned Mahavishnu Orchestra and Frank Zappa's, in addition to releasing some noteworthy albums such as "King Kong Jean-Luc Ponty Plays the Music of Frank Zappa" and "Ponty-Grappelli", with the great Stéphane Grappelli. The elaborate production, the excellent Fender Rhodes keyboard instrumentation, and the precise guitars of Sawyer and Ray Parker, along with the enormous versatility of an intricate rhythm section, support the sonic whirlwind of Ponty's electric violin and its multi-track characteristics a technique Ponty would refine for his subsequent releases. Fusing jazz-rock with elements of funk, folk, blues, and ambient/atmospheric music, the album features a succession of truly astonishing passages such as "Echoes of the Future", "Fight for Life", "Polyfolk Dance", "Now I Know", "Question with No Answer", and the title track. Despite being his least accessible and darkest work of this second phase, it is also the most elaborate and experimental of all his recordings from the 1970s.