John Coltrane - tenor sax McCoy Tyner - piano Jimmy Garrison - bass Elvin Jones - drums "Alabama" is a tribute to four children killed in the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing, an attack at a Birmingham, Alabama church by white supremecists on September 15, 1963. The melody is supposedly based on the speech patterns of Martin Luther King, Jr's eulogy. (www.youtube.com/watch?v=aiJ_0gp-T9A) Written by John Coltrane Recorded November 18, 1963 at the Van Gelder Studio, New Jersey Originally released on the album Live At Birdland, 1963, Impulse! AS-50 Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.