There is an asteroid, 5893, named after John Coltrane, and this episode zooms in on the single turning point that set his cosmic legacy in motion. In September 1957 Coltrane was a respected sideman, in the middle of a residency at the Five Spot with Thelonious Monk and deeply associated with Miles Davis, but executing other people’s visions. On September 15, 1957 he walked into Rudy Van Gelder’s studio in Hackensack, New Jersey, for his one and only session as a leader for Blue Note Records, drafting Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones from the Miles Davis rhythm section, pianist Kenny Drew, and rising horn players Lee Morgan and Curtis Fuller.

The hosts explain why one economic detail mattered so much: Blue Note paid the musicians to rehearse, which let Coltrane bring original, complex material instead of safe standards. He wrote four of the five tracks, with I’m Old Fashioned the lone exception, building the title track around an E-flat 7 sharp 9 chord, stretching Locomotion into a 44-bar form, and nodding to Tadd Dameron’s Lady Bird with Lazy Bird. They break down his emerging vertical, arpeggiated style, why Coltrane called Blue Train his favorite of his own albums in a 1960 interview even after recording Giant Steps, and the legacy that followed across Prestige, Atlantic and Impulse, including gold certification in 2001, a Grammy Hall of Fame induction, preserved homes in Philadelphia and Dix Hills, and the musical lineage of Alice and Ravi Coltrane.

• Coltrane’s position in 1957 as the indispensable contractor building other giants’ houses
• Why paid rehearsal time changed the compositions he could bring to the studio
• Sharp 9 chords, 44-bar blues forms and the glass-elevator idea of vertical playing
• Why a hard bop masterpiece stayed his favorite after he broke the rules on Giant Steps
• The restless reinvention that carried him from Blue Train to A Love Supreme