Deaf Dumb Blind (Summun Bukmun Umyun)

Deaf Dumb Blind
(Summun Bukmun Umyun)
Studio album by
ReleasedOctober 1970[1]
RecordedJuly 1, 1970
StudioA & R Studios, New York, NY
GenreSpiritual jazz
Length39:02
LabelImpulse!
ProducerEd Michel
Pharoah Sanders chronology
Jewels of Thought
(1969)
Deaf Dumb Blind
(Summun Bukmun Umyun)

(1970)
Thembi
(1971)

Deaf Dumb Blind (Summun Bukmun Umyun) is an album by the American jazz saxophonist Pharoah Sanders. It was recorded at A & R Studios in New York City on July 1, 1970, and released on Impulse! Records in the same year. The album's title is bilingual: "Summun Bukmun Umyun" is Arabic for "Deaf Dumb Blind".

The phrase صُمٌّ بُكْمٌ عُمْيٌ ṣummun, bukmun, ʻumyun is taken from verse 18 of Surat al-Baqarah in the Qur'an. According to the liner notes, the album is "predicated on spiritual truths and to the future enlightenment of El Kafirun or The Rejectors of Faith (non-believers)."

The performances on the album are strongly influenced by the music of Africa.

  1. ^ "Billboard". 24 October 1970.