Born August 27, 1937 in Detroit, Michigan, USA
Died January 12, 2007 in Los Angeles, California, USA
Also known by her adopted Sanskrit name Turiyasangitananda, Coltrane was an American jazz musician and composer, and in her later years a swamini. An accomplished pianist and one of the few harpists in the history of jazz, she recorded many albums as a leader, beginning in the late 1960s and early 1970s for Impulse! and other record labels. Her second husband was jazz saxophonist John Coltrane, with whom she performed in 1966–1967; their son is Ravi Coltrane, also a saxophonist. One of the foremost proponents of spiritual jazz, her eclectic music proved widely influential both within and outside the world of jazz.
Coltrane's professional music career slowed from the mid-1970s as she became more involved with her religious education. She founded the Vedantic Center in 1975 and the Shanti Anantam Ashram in California in 1983, where she served as spiritual director. On July 3, 1994, Swamini rededicated and inaugurated the land as Sai Anantam Ashram. During the 1980s and 1990s, she recorded several albums of Hindu devotional songs before returning to jazz in the 2000s.
She was taught to play the harp by Velma Froude at Cass Technical High School in Detroit, who had instructed Dorothy Ashby a couple of years earlier. Her first husband was artist with whom she had a daughter, Michele.