Ornette Coleman - Free Jazz (Episode 257)
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- Опубликовано: 10 фев 2025
- Story and review of Ornette Coleman's boundary-pushing experiment with twin quartets and an all-star lineup of avant-garde jazz players. 5 out of 5 stars... or possibly zero stars.
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Nice review (as always).
As I've tweeted you, I was surprised to hear that you'd been very wary of free jazz music. Although it's not 'free' jazz, maybe you should review "Our Man in Jazz", where Rollins, who loved Ornette's concept, tried to follow suit. However, as you might already know, it didn't work out so well for Rollins, who's ears were clearly more suited to working with (and off) chord progressions. And, I guess to make it a trilogy you should add in Coltrane's "The Avant-Garde" album, where Coltrane also couldn't quite get his understanding of Coleman's ideas to work for him - as we know, he was happier (later), in much more adventurous and less confining constraints with "Interstellar Space".
Again, it's interesting that in both cases of the above albums, that it was Cherry who shone on both records, sort of dancing with ease around both giants who struggled to understand 'how it was done'.
Lastly, I used to write for a free jazz and improvised music blog for many years, so as you can imagine, I heard a lot of that thing. And, if you're interested, not for reviewing but just to enjoy and find a way in, can I recommend you track down some of the Scandinavian jazzers, who often combine various strands of free improvisation in a much more 'listenable' way. Just one suggestion would be try Atomic, which has some of the big free improvisers names in there, yet mixes the various styles. Here's a video on YT you could try (their albums are well worth it too): ruclips.net/video/CRiKI78ASmI/видео.html
If you want more suggestion, just let me know.
Thanks for the thoughtful comment and suggestions. I am a bit of a Coltrane nut, and in fact it was his evolution which got me into free jazz… that and Archie Shepp’s The Magic Of Ju Ju, one of the first records I reviewed on this channel (though at that stage my reviews were somewhat disorganized rambles and I hadn’t landed on a format I liked). So I do have the record with Cherry which is a good effort (but). Have never heard that Rollins and will definitely dig up a copy following your recommendation. Thanks too re the Scandinavian players. For me, the world of European jazz, ECM etc is still largely unexplored as most of my collecting in jazz to date has been of the great American artists from the 50s and 60s.
As for free jazz, not sure it was daunting so much as I had this ill-informed bias, long held and under scrutinized. It’s also very clearly listening music as opposed to social music - it’s not getting played at dinner parties, and others in the household can object to it as background noise. And it’s only in the last few years I’ve had a dedicated listening space conducive to many hours of sonic exploration :).
@@TenMinuteRecordReviews if you like Our Man in Jazz, there’s also a cheap 6-Cd box set called Live at the Village gate you may want to pick up. Our Man in Jazz was a live disk and the box set has all the recordings from the project.
@@thirdcoast5755 thanks! One for the (ever growing) recommendation pile to explore.
Great review every musician on this album is fantastic, it has some of my favorite musicians such as Eric Dolphy and Freddie Hubbard. Both these musicians are also on Eric Dolphy's "Out To Lunch" album, which is one of my favorite albums of all time and it would be cool to see you do a review of it.
Thanks. It’s funny, I was going to reply and tell you I had already reviewed Out To Lunch but then I checked and no I haven’t. Could have sworn! Anyway great record and perhaps I’ll do it soon.
@Ten-Minute Record Reviews that would be awesome, thanks.
Fantastic review Alan!, thanks as always.. this comes very timely as I'm trying hard to dive into Coleman and I've been listening to A shape of Jazz to come on the Speakers Corner reissue. The recent Blue Note Ornette boxset is a pivotal point in the series (but not for me).
I assume the Speaker’s Corner release is as good as usual?
@@TenMinuteRecordReviews yes, thankfully! they generally do a fantastic job from the tapes and the quality is very good. Recently just received the Turrentine/Hubbard Concert (with herbie hancock) and its spellbindingly good! (Would love to see a Beastie Boys review sometime if that's your bag?) Cheers again.
@@Markymarkvinylnut I’ve actually done one a while ago. But it was a tad bittersweet as I realized my nostalgia for the record exceeded its actual quality! Ah well.
@@TenMinuteRecordReviews that happens sometimes...I think it's easy to get carried away with music as it's so personal (and that's the joy for me)
The mono pressings were needed for the folks who still had mono cartridges/systems and of course for airplay (the same reason promo copies of records were always mono). And for those asking themselves, "Airplay, for Coleman's 'Free Jazz'?" I can show you a jukebox 7" of Coltrane's, 'Ascension'. Seriously ;-)
"Honey I'll just pick a song, be right back."
@@TenMinuteRecordReviews The easiest way to get Arnold’s Diner all to yourself.
Do more free jazz-reviews!!!
That’s the plan :)
I've been listening to a lot of free jazz recently. I'm finding the hard bop a bit samey and not very interesting. I'm not sure if I like the free jazz yet but I can't stop listening to it. My favourite so far is don cherry complete communion.
Yes I do agree re hard bop. I think there is obviously a lot of great music there but there was a bit of a production line feel to the Lion-era Blue Notes I feel. I find I am always on a quest to be surprised and free jazz never lets you down on that front! though my current frontier is going deeper and deeper into the west coast scene.
Have you listened to much Archie Shepp? Give the Magic of Ju-Ju a try if not.